Advertise on podcast: Schooled

This two-part Schooled podcast by WHYY News highlights aspects of the Philadelphia School District that serve as an inspiration for a hit television show. The reporting took place in 2024 and 2025. Philadelphia native Quinta Brunson created the hit TV series, “Abbott Elementary,” as modeled upon real-life experiences students face learning in the Philly school system. The sitcom shines a light on the challenges that the school district faces — teacher shortages, limited resources, furniture and supplies – among the real-life issues incorporated into the show’s storylines. This episode focuses on the making of “Abbott Elementary,” its impact, Quinta’s ties to Philadelphia, and educators’ reactions to seeing their world enacted on the small screen.

In this episode, a look at how New Jersey responded to its own school funding lawsuit decades ago — and what Pennsylvania could learn. Then, a visit to the state capitol to see how legislators are responding to the recent court ruling that says Pennsylvania’s school funding system is unconstitutional. And, how underfunded schools are taking matters into their own hands while they wait for help.

Pennsylvania’s constitution says the legislature has to provide for a “thorough and efficient” system of schools. But what does that really mean?

Two neighboring public high schools show the inequity of Pennsylvania’s school funding system. We learn about the forces at play and how a lack of resources affects everyday life for students and teachers. Then, we meet the people who have dedicated their lives to solving the state’s school funding problem.

Public education in America is still divided between the haves and have-nots, and the problem doesn’t get much worse than in Pennsylvania. But change could be coming.

In exactly one year, a relatively large and diverse school district went from debating masks to targeting LGBTQ books. Here’s how it happened.

A book ban put the Central York School in the national spotlight. Meet the people who defeated it — and discover how it changed them.

New tapes shed light on an old story: the suspension of 32 Philly teachers during the 1950s. We explore what happened, and what it tells us about ourselves.

School leaders across the U.S. are looking for the next Shakoor Henderson: a promising Black, male educator in a field that sorely lacks diversity. So why is he on the verge of being pushed out of public education after a long, winding fight to get in? The answer lies in his past — and the barriers faced by many Black men in America.

COVID-19 upended the American education system and the impacts of the pandemic on schools will likely take decades to fully understand. There are big questions about learning loss. Attendance rates are down. Failure rates are up. And many students missed out on a year of normal social development. The isolation of virtual school has also been set against a backdrop of family members getting sick, dying, or losing jobs due to covid — all while there has been a spike in deadly gun violence in cities across the country. In this episode, we unpacking how the COVID year of schooling has affected students, parents and educators. Our conversation was recorded during a live event with a panel of first-hand experts who spoke intimately about how their lives were affected.

Dozens of school-aged children in Philadelphia were murdered since January 2020  — a spike that tracks with a surge in homicides in cities across the country. For loved ones, the pain of these losses has been exacerbated by the isolation of the pandemic. And without in-person school, classmates and teachers have tried to navigate their grief from a distance. This is the story of our other public health crisis, gun violence, told through the lives of three Philadelphia teenagers whose time was cut short.

The high school class of 2020 is bound for the history books. They were born in the wake of 9-11. Entered kindergarten during the Great Recession. Had their senior years interrupted by a global pandemic. And have now graduated into an uncertain future amid mass COVID-19 deaths, record unemployment and civic upheaval in the streets. In this episode we’re telling the stories of students coming of age in a moment where the world feels both ‘on hold’ and ‘on fire.’

A portrait of summer at a recreation center in a Philadelphia neighborhood where the threat of violent crime is never far off. Starting on the last day of school, we meet students — many living in nearby public housing — who embrace the structure set by staffers at the Hank Gathers Rec Center. Schools in the neighborhood often struggle to keep students orderly and engaged. Why is the rec center so different? What educational role does it play in the lives of students? This slice-of-life story explores the impact Gathers has on students living amid daily reminders of violence and trauma.

KIPP Philadelphia started a middle school in 2003 that promised to change students’ lives.  It was one of the city’s first “no excuses” charter schools, where administrators implemented a militaristic discipline system and promoted a laser focus on college for kids from low-income neighborhoods. They also regularly counseled students who didn’t embrace their methods to leave the school.  Now, 15 years later, we track down dozens of former students to ask: in the long run, did the school live up to its promise? How were lives affected? And how has the school’s original vision of success evolved?

We continue following Joshua Martinez and his classmates as they fight to graduate. But a teacher at El Centro raises serious questions about the rigor of the school that leads to bigger questions: For students who are far behind grade level, how much should we really expect? Where’s the line for who deserves a diploma?