Raising Citizens in the Second Trump Term
Civic education and talking to my 9-year-old about tariffs and DEI
I just spent the weekend with my 9-year-old daughter, Ellen, and my sister, Kimberly (with a bonus visit with executive producer and friend Norma). Inevitably, news stories and political issues came up. I love talking to Ellen about what’s going on in the world. Several times during those chats, I thought, “this is what I hope for all families: that we talk about hard things, and we enjoy it.” No matter how infuriating the news is, how intense the protests, how confusing the subject matter, I want to be in all of it with my people.
Today, we’re talking about kids and civics on two levels. First, Ellen and I discuss the Trump tariffs and the administration’s desire to purge anything DEI-adjacent from federal libraries and websites. Then, Lindsey Cormack shares her research about civic education and what works when we’re trying to raise citizens.
Outside of politics, I hope that Ellen’s enthusiasm for Broadway shows will be a light in your week.
Thank you for being in it with us and for welcoming my family so warmly to your podcast feeds.
-Beth
Topics Discussed
Beth and Ellen Discuss Tariffs, the Economy, and DEI
How to Raise a Citizen with Lindsey Cormack
Outside of Politics: Ellen Goes to Broadway
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Episode Resources
Pantsuit Politics Resources
Tickets to our 10th Anniversary Live Show in Cincinnati on Wednesday!
The Economy, Tariffs, and DEI with Ellen Silvers
News Quiz (Kentucky Educational Television)
Stocks Whipsaw With S&P 500 on the Precipice of a Bear Market (The New York Times)
Trump’s Trade War (Pantsuit Politics)
Maya Angelou memoir, Holocaust book are among those pulled from Naval Academy library in DEI purge (NBC News)
Harriet Tubman webpage targeted amid Trump-led anti-DEI efforts (The Guardian)
How to Raise a Citizen (and Why it’s up to You to Do It)
Show Credits
Pantsuit Politics is hosted by Sarah Stewart Holland and Beth Silvers. The show is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. Alise Napp is our Managing Director and Maggie Penton is our Director of Community Engagement.
Our theme music was composed by Xander Singh with inspiration from original work by Dante Lima.
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Episode Transcript
Beth Silvers [00:00:30] This is Beth Silvers. You're listening to Pantsuit Politics. Sarah is off this week. So today I am so happy to be joined by my daughter, Ellen, who is nine years old and in the fourth grade. We're going to talk about the economy. We're going to talk about tariffs. Yes, my nine-year-old and I are going to have a little tariff discussion. We are going talk about the Trump administration's elimination of DEI throughout the federal government. And then you'll hear a conversation that Sarah and I had a few months ago with Lindsay Cormack. She is the author of How to Raise a Citizen. And she shares her vision with us for raising engaged, thoughtful people, which is I hope what Sarah and I are doing in our houses and what I know so many of you are doing in yours. And then Outside of Politics, Ellen and I are going to talk about our weekend. We just took a trip with the two of us and my sister to New York to see some Broadway shows and her enthusiasm for these shows just bubbles over and I hope that you really enjoy it as much as we enjoyed discussing it.
[00:01:21] Before we jump into all of that, I want to remind you of two things. First, our premium members on Substack that we call the Spice Cabinet are joining us to slow read the book, Habits of the Heart this year. It is so relevant. My friend Maggie is reading it along with us and we just send each other quotes back and forth. She sends me snapshots from pages like, "Oh, this is it. This is what we need to talk about." It's excellent. So we will have our next episode about the book available by the end of April for you. There's plenty of time to dig in and catch up with us. And certainly this is a way that we are trying to be civic minded and to think really deeply about what it is we're trying to do together when we create our culture and our laws and our government and all of the things that help our society function.
[00:02:05] Second, tickets to our live show in Cincinnati are now on sale for our premium members. The Spice Cabinet gets the first run at those tickets. They're going fast, which we're thrilled about. Sales will open to everyone tomorrow at noon Eastern on our website, pantsuitpoliticshow.com. If we do sell out of tickets, and we think we will, you can get on the wait list or buy a virtual ticket to join us in real time from wherever you are. This is our big 10 year birthday party. So we really want everyone to be able to join us at least in some capacity. Thank you so much for supporting us to get to this 10 year milestone, for being excited with us about celebrating in Cincinnati in July, and for joining us for today's episode. Next up, Ellen and I are going to talk about the economic fallout following the president's tariff announcements. Hi Ellen, thanks for being here.
Ellen [00:03:00] Hi.
Beth Silvers [00:03:01] I want to start by talking about the economy because that is what is on everyone's minds in the United States right now.
Ellen [00:03:07] Yeah, you showed me a picture on your phone and it does not look good. It's like better than you-- and you can't see this because this is a podcast, but my hand just went up a little bit high and then it went down like a lot.
Beth Silvers [00:03:24] Yes, like a rollercoaster drop.
Ellen [00:03:25] And if you don't understand what I'm saying, just search up a picture if you haven't already.
Beth Silvers [00:03:31] We can put some links in our show notes, but I think everyone is familiar with what's going on. So I wanted to see if you understand why that's happening. What is reaching the fourth grade about the economy right now?
Ellen [00:03:43] So we do this thing in fourth grade called news quiz, where we watch a-- it's basically the news, but more simplified for kids. Since the 2024 election, there's been a lot of stuff on the decisions that Donald Trump is making. And it said one thing about tariffs, and it gave us a very brief explanation. So I don't really understand it yet. Can you talk to me about that?
Beth Silvers [00:04:12] Sure. I think the easiest way to understand tariffs might be to make you a business owner today. So can you close your eyes and imagine that you have just inherited a lot of money and you have decided to use that money to open a business next week here in Kentucky. What business are you opening?
Ellen [00:04:36] Ellen's Pickled Mangoes.
Beth Silvers [00:04:43] Okay, Ellen, I didn't see that coming. Ellen's Pickled Mangoes. It sounds a little bit like a Mad Lib, but we're going with it. Okay, so for pickled mangoes, you're going to sell to Kroger or something in a grocery store?
Ellen [00:04:54] Yeah.
Beth Silvers [00:04:55] Okay. Well, we in Kentucky know quite a bit about pickling, so you could probably build a commercial kitchen and a warehouse and bring in your mangoes and pickle them here and package them up and then sell them to Kroger, because we're right here with Kroger in Cincinnati.
Ellen [00:05:12] Yeah, but wait, we don't have mangoes in Kentucky that we've grown.
Beth Silvers [00:05:16] Right, mangoes do not tend to grow in Kentucky. And you're going to need a lot of mangoes if you're pickling them to sell. So you got to do some research and figure out where you can buy your mangoes. So let me give you some options. Do you want to buy your mangos from Mexico or from India or China or Indonesia or Thailand?
Ellen [00:05:37] Let's say Thailand.
Beth Silvers [00:05:39] Okay, so you're going to buy your mangoes from Thailand. Thailand is going to have agricultural producers just like we have here in the United States. They're going to cultivate their mangoes. They're going to put them in shipping containers and they're going to come by boat from Thailand to the United States. And when that boat comes to the United States, it's going to come up to a port where there are officials from the government who have paperwork that has to be filled out to make sure that all the rules are being followed on things coming into the United States to make sure it's safe to bring these mangoes into the United States.
Ellen [00:06:16] Yeah, that's fair. It's like mangoes going through TSA.
Beth Silvers [00:06:19] It is like mangoes going through TSA. Okay, part of what's going to happen in that process now, President Trump has said, we're going to charge a 36% tariff on goods coming in from Thailand. Now, mangoes are a little bit of complicated example because sometimes the tariffs are different around food, but we're just going to pretend it's 36% with everything else from Thailand, and that means that your cost as the business owner for these mangoes is going to be 36% higher than whatever you're being charged to have the mangoes grown and picked and shipped to you.
Ellen [00:06:57] Yeah that makes sense because mangoes are kind of special to Kentucky because they don't grow in Kentucky so they're special, so they should be higher costed or something. I don't know.
Beth Silvers [00:07:14] Yeah, you have to pay for the things that you need. And so they're going to cost more now because of this tariff. And that 36% is not going to pay the growers of the mangoes or the shippers of the mangos. It's going to go to the U.S. government. That's what the tariff is. It's basically a tax on the mangoes. Now, you also are going to need jars for your pickled mangoes.
Ellen [00:07:35] I will need jars.
Beth Silvers [00:07:37] And you've done some research, let's pretend, and found the lowest cost jar that's acceptable to you and quality that you can buy is from China, okay? So you're going to have a factory in China producing these glass jars. Again, they're going to be shipped here to the United States. You got to pay for the jars and the shipping, and now you're going to pay a tariff on top of that. So you are adding more tax. Now, when you figure out what you're going to sell your pickled mangoes for, the first number you have to know is what it costs you to make that jar, right? Because when you sell your pickled mangoes to a customer at Kroger, Kroger needs to make a little bit of money and you need to make little bit money and you got to pay for all of the costs that went into that jar. Does that make sense?
Ellen [00:08:26] Mm-hmm.
Beth Silvers [00:08:27] And you got to pay for your workers who are help making it. Cost, cost, cost everywhere.
Ellen [00:08:32] Money, money, money.
Beth Silvers [00:08:33] So those tariffs are increasing the cost of the mangoes to you and probably ultimately to your customer because you got to figure those costs. You can't just say, well, I'm not going to think of the 36% tariff as a cost to me. I'm going to think it as a gift to the US government. That's not how business works, right?
Ellen [00:08:54] Yeah, it doesn't work like that.
Beth Silvers [00:08:57] Okay, so that's the deal with the tariffs. The president has put these tariffs on products from countries all over the world, which means the cost of just about everything will go up because there is just more cost to do business and have things moving around the world. His idea is that this is going to make the world more fair to America.
Ellen [00:09:18] His is Donald Trump, right?
Beth Silvers [00:09:20] Correct, his is Donald. Thailand, for example, does put quite a bit of tariffs on products that are coming to them from the United States. So there are both taxes that other countries place on products we ship to them. There's also something else he's really worried about called the trade deficit. And the trade deficit exists when the United States is bringing more in from a country than that country is buying from the United States. So in our house, we have a trade deficit with every company that we buy things from because we don't sell anything back to them, right?
Ellen [00:09:59] Yeah.
Beth Silvers [00:10:00] We buy a lot from Kroger. We sell nothing to Kroger until your pickled mangoes business takes off. So we have a deficit with them. And that's what happens with the United States in a lot of countries. And that really happens for a bunch of reasons. But the two I want to talk to you about that I think will make sense to you are, one, that the United State doesn't manufacture a lot of stuff. We make things in the form of services.
Ellen [00:10:26] Yeah. Whenever I get something like a lot of my stuff says made in China or stuff like that.
Beth Silvers [00:10:32] What do you want to be when you grow up? I'm not going to hold you to it, but just what's something you're thinking about wanting to be when you grow up?
Ellen [00:10:40] An author or like writing movies or director or something like that. Something where I get to write.
Beth Silvers [00:10:48] So those are services. You're not going to make something and produce it and ship it and put it on a boat and sell it to another country, but you might take part in writing a script for a movie that is seen all over the world. So that's an export of a service that we create here, but that's different than stuff that is taxable in that way. So one of the reasons that we have a trade deficit with a number of countries is because they make more products than we make, and we make more services than they do. Does that make sense?
Ellen [00:11:20] Yeah, that makes sense.
Beth Silvers [00:11:21] Another reason is because the United States is a really wealthy country. And so we are going to buy a lot more things from other countries than they buy from us because our citizens are wealthy and demand more things. And the kinds of things that we do make here are pretty expensive. And citizens in countries that are not as wealthy as we are. cannot afford the things that have been made in America and then shipped on boats around the world. Does that make sense?
Ellen [00:11:50] Yeah, that makes sense.
Beth Silvers [00:11:51] So there are parts of having a trade deficit that I'm not sure we would want to change about our country because we presumably like being a wealthy country.
Ellen [00:12:00] Well, wouldn't everyone?
Beth Silvers [00:12:02] Wouldn't everyone. That's right. And so it's kind of interesting, that's a good point that you make, that Donald Trump believes that America is getting the raw end of the deal. He thinks that the rest of the world has been unfair to us. And I think the rest of the world might have some notes about that, where they see it differently.
Ellen [00:12:19] Yeah, I don't think that's true.
Beth Silvers [00:12:22] So right now in the news, there are reporters asking questions of the president about what he thinks about the fact that a lot of economic indicators, those graphs that you saw, are looking so bad. And he said, "Sometimes you have to take some medicine." Which he means he thinks that he's doing the right thing for the economy. even if it's painful in the short term, he thinks in the long term it's going to be really good for America. But we just have to wait and see. Most economists do not agree with him that this is the right prescription for America. And other countries are saying, well, if you're going to charge 36% on our goods, we're going to charge 36% on yours coming back our way. So there's a little bit of what we would call a trade war starting to begin. And that sounds maybe overblown, because you don't think of a war as being about numbers, right?
Ellen [00:13:12] The war of the mangoes.
Beth Silvers [00:13:13] The war of the mangoes. But trade is pretty important, or at least a lot of people think it is important (and I'm one of them) to peace in the world. Because if I need your mangoes and you need my banking services or my movies, we both need something from each other. And so we probably both want each other to do well because I want you to keep making all the mangoes and you want me to keep make the movies. And that's a bargain that while it's not completely fair to either of us, and maybe we both don't like all of it, hopefully it means that we want our countries to be peaceful and successful and not harm each other. When we start to get mad at each other over the price of things, and especially when those things are necessities for people's lives, that's when it can get a little scary out there. Does all that make sense?
Ellen [00:14:06] Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, actually.
Beth Silvers [00:14:08] Okay, I want to talk to you about something else that's going on with Donald Trump's decisions. Have you talked much at school in your news reports about his decisions on something called DEI?
Ellen [00:14:22] Not really.
Beth Silvers [00:14:23] Do you know what DEI stands for?
Ellen [00:14:26] No, I don't think so.
Beth Silvers [00:14:27] Have you heard the word diversity?
Ellen [00:14:29] Yeah, that's like different.
Beth Silvers [00:14:33] Yeah, differences.
Ellen [00:14:34] Differentness.
Beth Silvers [00:14:35] So that's the D. What about the word equity?
Ellen [00:14:38] I think I've heard it before; I just don't really know the meaning now.
Beth Silvers [00:14:41] It's kind of a hard word to understand the meaning of. The way that I think about it is that equity is a search for fairness. When you take all of the circumstances into account, what seems fair. So that's the E. And then I is inclusion. I know you know the word inclusion.
Ellen [00:14:58] Do I?
Beth Silvers [00:14:58] Do you? I feel like that's what you all talk about at school all the time, making people feel like they belong.
Ellen [00:15:04] Like including people. Yeah, then I know what that word means.
Beth Silvers [00:15:09] So that's it. Diversity, equity, and inclusion. That acronym, DEI, has come to almost stand in as a symbol for a whole bunch of things, like trainings about race or social class, like programs that look for people of a certain gender or race or class to be promoted or hired in a business because we don't have a lot of people like that here and we want to increase our diversity. It has come to mean a whole lot of different things. And the president does not like those things. And so he has ordered that the government-- and you know the government is huge, right? It's lots and lots and lot of agencies.
Ellen [00:16:02] Very, very big.
Beth Silvers [00:16:02] He's ordered that government stop doing anything that has to do with DEI. So first I just want to get your reaction to that. How does that sound to you?
Ellen [00:16:12] That's just like it's confusing to me. Just like, why?
Beth Silvers [00:16:17] Well, he thinks that those programs are stuck in the past and are very negative and that they are in some ways not eliminating prejudice, but reversing it. So I think he would say if you spend a bunch of time talking about how bad slavery was in schools, you end up making white children feel bad.
Ellen [00:16:46] But isn't that just learning about history? I feel like kids need to know about that.
Beth Silvers [00:16:53] I think so, too. And that's why I wanted to talk to you about this because this has started to take some forms that I find a little bit weird. For example, the Naval Academy.
Ellen [00:17:08] So isn't it naval like belly button?
Beth Silvers [00:17:11] It is, but it's also like referring to the Navy. So training people to go in the Navy. The Naval Academy's library has taken some books out of it. One of them is I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. You know who Maya Angelous is, don't you?
Ellen [00:17:27] Mm-hmm
Beth Silvers [00:17:28] She's a poet we've talked about and an author.
Ellen [00:17:30] Yeah. You showed me some of her poems.
Beth Silvers [00:17:32] One is a book called Our Time is Now by Stacey Abrams. Do you know who Stacey Abraham is?
Ellen [00:17:38] No.
Beth Silvers [00:17:39] She is a woman who ran for governor in Georgia. And then one is called Memorializing the Holocaust by Janet Jacobs. Do you what the Holocaust is?
Ellen [00:17:49] Kind of.
Beth Silvers [00:17:55] Yeah, you'll learn more about it in the next couple of years.
Ellen [00:17:57] Can you give me like a little recap?
Beth Silvers [00:17:59] Yes, Jane has spent a lot of time learning about it at her school this year, so that's coming up in your education.
Ellen [00:18:04] I've heard of the Holocaust. I just don't know what it is.
Beth Silvers [00:18:06] You've heard of Adolf Hitler and World War Two?
Ellen [00:18:09] Oh, so it's about Hitler.
Beth Silvers [00:18:10] It's about Hitler and about killing Jews and taking them from their families and taking their property and just the terrible, terrible way that he tried to erase a whole group of people.
Ellen [00:18:24] Big thumbs down.
Beth Silvers [00:18:27] Yes. So those books have been taken out of this library because they seem too much like DEI efforts to the Trump administration. The National Park Service website removed references to Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad because that seems too much DEI. Now, you're making some tough faces. Is this really bothering you?
Ellen [00:18:51] Yeah, it is, because that's like telling kids that everything in the world has always been perfect.
Beth Silvers [00:18:58] And what's the danger of that?
Ellen [00:19:00] They need to know what happened so they don't grow up treating people badly.
Beth Silvers [00:19:07] I totally agree with you. Now, I don't think any of this is the end of the world today because we have so many ways to communicate and so much information about history. But I do think it's significant and important for the reason that you were putting out there that it sends a message. And it is really, to me, a good time for us to all say, well, what does it make me feel when I read something about the past? When I read about how white people in the South treated black people, not just during the Civil War, but all the way into the 1950s and 1960s, and later, what does it mean for me to say, gosh, white people have been pretty cruel to black people over time? How does that make you feel when you learn about those things at school?
Ellen [00:19:59] Sometimes it makes me feel a little sad, but I just try to remember that most people don't treat people like that anymore. I mean, it's fine, it's just-- well it's not fine, but I don't feel like it's making me feel bad about myself and my race.
Beth Silvers [00:20:25] Yeah, I don't either. Sometimes I think about do I have any responsibility today related to any of this? Which is, I think, a really difficult question.
Ellen [00:20:36] I mean, technically no because you weren't one of those people who treated African American people like that. So, I would say no
Beth Silvers [00:20:48] You would say no?
Ellen [00:20:49] Yeah.
Beth Silvers [00:20:50] It's a hard conversation because also maybe in some ways I still benefit from that history in ways that other people are harmed by it still because what we do lasts longer than our lives, right? And so there are some really hard questions around all of this that adults are I think avoiding right now. I think we're avoiding some of those really hard questions by fighting in pretty extreme ways by saying we don't want to do those hard questions. Let's get rid of some of this history. Let's not talk about it. Let's focus on the positive. And I'm a focus on positive kind of person in my life. But I just don't think that we're getting this right. I think were avoiding some really thorny things by just trying to breeze through it.
Ellen [00:21:43] It's unavoidable though. This stuff really happened. You can't avoid the history.
Beth Silvers [00:21:49] And I think your education would be worse if you tried to.
Ellen [00:21:52] Yeah.
Beth Silvers [00:21:54] Your sister has gone to both the Holocaust Museum and the National Museum for African American History this week. And I'm so glad that she got to have those experiences and I think it's important for her to keep having experiences like that, and for you to have these experiences and for dad and I to keep learning about our history. You can never know too much about the past because I think it's a way to really understand where we are now.
Ellen [00:22:18] Yeah, I definitely agree with that.
Beth Silvers [00:22:21] Well, learning is the theme of the interview that we wanted to share today with everybody. We have Lindsey McCormack here to talk about the importance of civic education. Ellen, do you know what civic education is?
Ellen [00:22:33] Well, civic sounds like civil, and civil is in the word civil war, so is it about, like, black history, stuff like that?
Beth Silvers [00:22:42] Well, that is such a great connection. That's such a good set of associations. It's actually even bigger than that. It's just about the country. When we talk about civics, we're talking about how we organize ourselves as people and do the things that we do through our government and our laws. So Lindsey is here to talk about being in schools and teaching you about the three branches of government and about how bills become laws and about the court systems work and all those things.
Ellen [00:23:10] Yeah, cool!
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:23:19] Lindsey, I don't know if you know this. This is a funny story. We pitched a book proposal once called Raising Citizens.
Lindsey Cormack [00:23:26] I did not know that.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:23:27] True story. And what I love about your book and the fact that you're the one that ended up actually writing the book, is that ours was so focused on parents and just from the lens of parents. And I think the smartest thing that you do and really orient from the beginning is that this is a societal project. This is not one more thing to put in the laps of parents. So how did you get out of that parental vision and expand this approach?
Lindsey Cormack [00:23:59] Something that I think our research shows us is that you never know whose civic role model you're going to be. You don't know if you're a teacher or if you are someone who they interact with in the street and they say like I could look up to that person.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:24:10] I love that.
Lindsey Cormack [00:24:11] If you're like in line voting you just never know who civic [inaudible] you might be. So it is for parents, but it's also for everyone else who wants things to get a little bit better.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:24:19] I love that.
Beth Silvers [00:24:22] When we think about kids and civic education, what I always wonder about is how are adults continuing their civic education? Kids can be a nice opportunity for that, right? I remember this dinner where my husband and I learned about a fifth ocean, because we grew up believing in four oceans. And when our kids rolled out the Southern Ocean, we were shocked and dismayed and argued with them for a good long while before we all looked together at the history of how it came to be, that we identified the Southern Ocean. And so I wonder where you see opportunities for adults to keep refreshing what we know so that we can be that civic role model to kids.
Lindsey Cormack [00:24:59] Well, I think what you just said is something that I'm getting the feedback from parents who have this and have taken on the project, is they're like, oh man, I'm really learning things when I talk with my kids about this stuff. Because we know learning is not one way. We know that when we engage with our kids on something, they're going to teach us something, whether that's like a new perspective or a way we haven't thought about it. Or if they ask us something and we don't know it, it's just such a good opportunity to model information seeking behavior. To say like, I don't now, but I know how I can go figure that out, let's do that together. But I think beyond that, there are just so many opportunities for adult learning because we know so little to begin with. We have so much information and we have so little that we really know about how politics and government operate that they abound the opportunities to go learn things. For most people, it's in their state and local. For most that's where they have these really big blind spots because they don't understand how those politics work.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:25:53] I really love your positive approach to this, but let's be honest, where are we at with the state of civic education? Because if we don't know anything, we got there somehow, Lindsey. Where are we at across the country with civic education with kids and schools?
Lindsey Cormack [00:26:15] Yeah, so this is a great and a big question and a hard one to answer, but we have some good indicators. The reason why it's hard is every state gets to decide how they're going to do this and they make different choices. Some states say, we're going to have a test at the end. Some states really pull from the citizen exam. Some states say it's not going to be required at all. And so it's really hard, but there's like a modal style of delivery throughout the U.S., which is usually in seventh or eighth grade kids will get a class that's called U.S. History; sometimes it's called World History, but it's this umbrella social studies term where they're going to learn a little bit about U. S. History. And then we usually wait until your second semester, your senior or high school, and we give you a class called Government where you learn everything you need to know. It's like all the terminology, how you're going to vote. It's like a little too little too late for most of us because the second semester of high school is not when we're our most engaged or wanting to learn stuff. And so the indicators that we're not doing this that well-- there's two big ones. First, is when we look at the nation's report card, which is assessments of eighth graders, only about 23% of them have what's considered proficient civics understanding.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:27:19] Wow.
Lindsey Cormack [00:27:20] And that score that we have nationally is the same now as it was in 1998. It like had a minute where it bumped up a few points and it's right back where it was. So we done doing this. We know that in middle school. But when we look at high schoolers, when we look at people who are taking AP U.S. government, which is an opt-in class, and it is only like 2% of students overall, it is one of the lowest scoring AP tests that we administer. Out of the like 38 that we administered last year, it was the 37th lowest with most of the students who take it not earning three or more, which means they don't get college credit. It's not considered passing. And so those two score metrics are really good indicators that our kids don't know what's happening. But we also know if you look at voter registration and voter turnout, the youngest people are the ones who are most likely to be left out. And so those programmatic indicators show us that we're behind there, too. And it's been this way for a while. It doesn't have to be this way forever. We can learn these things. We can turn this around. We see this in adult learning because from 18 to 65 you get better at these things. But we are not doing that work right now throughout most of the US.
Beth Silvers [00:28:21] How would you capture the components of a robust civics’ curriculum? What are we really talking about when we say that we want kids to learn more about civics?
Lindsey Cormack [00:28:31] That's a great question. And I will tell you I think the word civics is not my favorite because I think civics is this like anodyne term that doesn't really mean anything. And people are like, is it volunteering? Is it donating? Is it voting? So the way that I like to think about it is politics and government because I think those are two related but separate understandings of the world. And when I think about what our kids need to know, they need to know the constitution. They need to understand what the rules of the game are. The constitution is like the charter of government, it's a very fundamental piece that many of our kids get out of high school having never read. So that's like a problem from the get-go. But they also need to understanding how our politics happens in actuality. So we talk so much about the electoral college and we'll talk about the presidential primary, but most high schoolers get out not knowing what a primary election is for their house races, for the Senate, for state and local government positions. And in most parts of the U.S., the pivotal election is that primary election. That's because by the time you get to the general, there's either more registered Democrats or more registered Republicans, and so that's going to be who wins.
[00:29:36] But if they don't even know what the primary election is, they don't know if it's open or closed, if they have to be registered with a party or not. Those programmatic pieces are left out of most of our curricular choices. They also oftentimes don't really learn about federalism. In the course of doing this book, I had six research assistants. And we interview teachers in nearly every U.S. state. And something that they repeatedly stressed to us is the notion of federalism is really lost on them. They think that government is whatever happens in D.C. when we all know that the reality is government is what happens down the street in your city hall; it's what happens at your state government. Yes, D. C. does some big pieces, but so much of our quality of life decisions happen closer to home. And our kids don't know about this because we don't give it enough curricular time. We don't prioritize it in our funding for K through 12. And so it's hard for them to get these pieces. If they had them, they'd be better served. We also really teach them how to register to vote in a lot of schools. And that's indicative-- or we have an indicator of that by how few 18-year-olds are registered to vote.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:30:36] Well, and I think just with everything, with kids, there's only so much talking at you can do with regards to education. Like, here's an example from my own life. I graduated from law school and I knew that I wanted to go back home and run for office. And I, through just trying to learn through online research, could not sort out the structure of my city government and I had just graduated from law school. It's not like I didn't have the skills available. I had to get home in the community and work in the community and understand it on the ground before I could really absorb that structure, absorb all that. So how do we get kids that instruction that is absorbing and engaging when civic participation among adults is at historic lows?
Lindsey Cormack [00:31:40] The experience that you just described, I think, is one that a lot of us would have. Part of it is online information about city government is really hard to access. It's not usually well maintained. It's all idiosyncratic. It's whoever knows the most about the internet set it up on whatever town you're in. So that's hard. But I think something that would be better that we could start earlier is integrating kids' understanding of politics into seeing those spaces and meeting those people. So Something that I recommend in my book is that if you have young kids in your life, offer to introduce them to your mayor, let them meet your city council person. That not only humanizes government, but it shows them like, okay, here's some people, might be my neighbors, maybe they look like me, maybe they don't. And so they get a sense of what that is because the experience of politics is how we really learn it, not so much the, like, let me tell you this then you're going to recall that information on a test. And so that's one thing we should do.
[00:32:32] It's also true, and this is something that I struggle with in the state of New Jersey where I work, we don't have a requirement for middle schoolers or high schoolers to go see the state capitol. I think that's wild because we have a commuter legislature essentially in New Jersey, small enough that everyone who goes and works in that government comes in, does the work, goes home. So we could have field trips for everyone for them to go and see these spaces. And say what you will about capital cities, there is something about understanding where is this locus of power? Where do these decisions get made? Where does the work happen? And so we need to make sure that our kids see these things. And I actually think a lot of them will be wowed by it. Most government buildings, regardless of where you are in the United States, are beautiful. They really are. And they are structures that we don't really see replicated in hotels or big office buildings. They just have a different ornateness to them. So there's this stuff about government that we really don't expose them to, and there's so much that can be done without just lecturing at someone.
Beth Silvers [00:33:24] My nine-year-old recently met our mayor because our mayor's office had a Halloween art contest and the mayor went out and met all the winners personally. And I thought that was so smart. And I wonder if you see other examples of government officials reaching back, not just asking parents or schools to get the kids to them, but where they're going to where they are to do this kind of civic role modeling.
Lindsey Cormack [00:33:51] Yeah, we see this throughout the United States in different ways usually at a smaller city, not so much a bigger city. I have an example from like Olifa, Kansas. They have these arts events that they put on and then mayor will go to them and he'll make sure he walks around. And it's a part-time mayor, as many of our mayors are. And it just like doing a little FaceTime. They also have face painting for the kids. They have horses that kids can ride on. So it's a space that kids can be at. And I think the more we get that, the better our systems will be because the way that our government works best is if it reflects the will of the people. If we don't know what our children or youngest adults are going to want, we can't reflect those wills as well. But making sure that it's a two way thing, like you're saying, like invite them to a space and go do those things. Or these contests that are asking people to drop a like I Voted sticker, I love them because you get a bunch of middle schoolers who do it or high schoolers. And you get these like crazy zany designs but guess what, that's engaging in the process in a neat way and then everyone gets to wear it. I think those are some of the best initiatives that are happening right now.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:34:51] I love that and also I didn't get one. I voted early and I didn't get the winner.
Beth Silvers [00:34:56] I didn't either.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:34:57] And we're still upset about it over here, Lindsey. You just really touched a sore spot because our winner was delightful. It had a horse. There was a competition. I followed closely and I did get the sticker. So there was a risk here.
Lindsey Cormack [00:35:09] Yeah, that's a frustration. We had special ones in New York City, depending on which day you voted on. And I didn't know that until after. And they were like if you vote on Halloween, you get the spooky one. And if you vote on this day you get a different one. I was like, oh, I didn't realize.
Beth Silvers [00:35:22] A spooky one. That's very fun.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:35:22] But then there's like a Pokémon energy that I'm like, I want them all. Oh, no. Okay, so we're spending a lot of time on the governance aspect of politics and government. Let's talk about the politics part because I think that's where parents feel an enormous amount of pressure. The headline comes up, the scandal comes up. The foreign conflict comes up and I think it's so hard and I know you really worked through this. What are we talking about? We're talking about a toddler? Are we talking a high schooler? Are we talking about a scandal that might be adult? Are we talking about something that affects their lives? How do you sort out all that complexity inside of talking about the political environment with your kids?
Lindsey Cormack [00:36:03] I think there's a few layers to it. And the one that I always start with is you know your kids best. You know if you're going to scare your kids or not. And there's not really a good reason for our sub-9-year-old kids to talk to them about something that they have no control over that might be really fearsome. Like we were talking about some violence in New York City the other night, and the 7-year old was around. She was really scared despite the fact that's not going to really occur to her. It was very targeted violence. And so I think you got to defer to how you know you kids best. The second big piece is I really wish that parents would be cognizant of the narrative that they are using to talk about politics because our kids, from the time they are zero to 18, they are washed over in the sense that politics is negative. And that's not even just in the news. If you look at like Paw Patrol or if you look at the Simpsons or other children's media and literature, their government figures are at best like bumbling doofuses who kind of get it right by accident; and at worst, they're out to do harm to their city. We do not have like a lot of aspirational political figures in children's literature entertainment, that sort of world. And so I think it's a parent's job to sort of make sure that they self-monitor in a way where it's not always complaining about politics. And that's hard if you're queuing off the media because the negative stories are the ones that sell, the ones that go viral.
[00:37:17] And I really think it is about looking for the other pieces that you can point to as bright spots. So if you got a new park that opened, that's a great thing. That's a collective decision that someone in government made, our politics came together that we value this. And so I think that's like the orientation that I hope parents have in the second place. It's like, you know what, I want to be able to talk about these things, but you cannot just cue off of whatever the media is because it is always or nearly always overwhelmingly negative. But let's say you do want to have that discussion. I think the things that are important to model for your kids is staying calm, being able to perspective share, being able perspective see and say, you know what, your journey is different than mine. You may be coming to this problem at a different way. We might not get to the same solution. Guess what? That's okay. Because that's not really modeled for them in many other environments. They think if I'm fighting with someone over politics, it's either because they're stupid or they're evil. And we know that's true. We know that there's everything in the middle and we just have to be sure that they see us do that sort of work instead of the work that they probably see if they're watching quick things on TikTok or seeing YouTube shorts or something, which is usually inflammatory. It's our job to show them what it is to have good, reasonable discourse and to point out the positives when we can.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:38:26] That culture point is such a good one. I was trying to think of an example in my head and I had to go back to Annie with FDR. And that's a long time ago. That's like the only positive portrayal of a politician in children's literature I could think of. Annie, that's all I could of. I can't think of like a positive Kennedy.
Beth Silvers [00:38:42] I mean, Mr. Rogers.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:38:44] Okay. Mr. Rogers. The helpers.
Beth Silvers [00:38:45] Mr. Rogers would occasionally show the helpers and take us to the mayor's office or something like that.
Lindsey Cormack [00:38:51] Yeah. And there's PBS. There's this new show called City Island, and it is very much like here's the parts of a community that work together. Most of our kids lit does have this sort of anti-government undertone.
Beth Silvers [00:39:06] Well, I want to ask about media as part of civic education. I noticed when we were talking about what should that curriculum include, media didn't come up in that list. And I really feel for teachers because I think right now maybe the best thing that we can give our kids is an understanding of how you go find the answer to a question. And I understand that our teachers are stuck, we have a chicken and egg problem. We're trying to give our kids a sensibility about media that most of the adults in their lives don't have. And so what do you see as a path forward there?
Lindsey Cormack [00:39:41] Yeah, this is a great and hard issue. And it does seem to be that most of the people who are doing civic education work on state levels are also bundled in with the people doing media literacy or like AI literacy, that's all sort of wrapped up. So I think that's the goal of a lot of those people because they see them as together. When we talk about how do we teach our kids to go find an answer, I think it's really complicated because in a lot the ways that we like get our news now it's not so much seeking, it's like whatever comes to us algorithmically is the parts we're going to learn. And so I noticed this with my own 12-year-old. She'll ask me sometimes for help on homework and I'll go try to figure it out. She'll be like, "Gosh, you can figure this out really fast." And I do think there's this information-seeking skill that's not that well-developed because I don't know exactly why. And part of that might be being from a generation where I couldn't always get an answer on the internet, so I did sometimes have to go to a library and have a microfiche or look at it and it's like I had to do a little bit more.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:40:37] Oh, microfiche. We really are back with little [inaudible]. I'll tell you what.
Lindsey Cormack [00:40:42] Yeah. And so I think part of that, as an example of something that you can do, is to do a dual research with your kids. So that's like take 10 minutes, say, "Go figure out what you can on this, I'll figure out what I can on and we'll compare." Because we know that we're going to go to different places. We know that algorithmically we're shunted to find different information. And so if you can say, here's where I went, here is where they went, compare those things, you can learn something about what they're seeing and they can learn something about what your process is.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:41:09] Yeah. When we're in college campuses, we tell the students all the time, please don't let an algorithm send you your news. Please go find your news, listen to a daily podcast, get a daily email in your inbox. Even if you feel there's some bias among the source, you'll start to understand it and be able to sniff it out a little bit better if you're listening to them or reading them every single day. I think, as I was listening to you talk about this, I'm going to make a pitch for civic culture and the word civic. Because I do think what we're talking about is a little bigger than politics and governance because we're taking about the media, we're talking about journalism, which is absolutely a fundamental tenet if you read the Constitution of a healthy civic culture. They're participating in another institution that I think is massively important for our civic culture, which is the public school system. That's their piece of this puzzle, right?
[00:42:07] And this more expansive understanding of even the way businesses interact with the government and interact with governments and showing them that like this is all interconnected because we're all interconnected. And I think the struggle I have as a parent is the more you try to explain, the bigger it gets and the more expansive, and then they're shutting down because they're overwhelmed. I think that's what's so hard about this. It's like it can get so big so fast even if you're just trying to keep it limited to news, even if you’re just trying to keep limited to local government, right? Like the way local governments interact with charities and the way the local government interacts with the public schools and our property taxes. Like it just gets so big. How do you keep it contained in a way that doesn't shut them off because they're like, oh Lord, I don't want to know all this.
Lindsey Cormack [00:42:58] It's hard. But one of the things that I think is curious is like our topography is expansive, the understandings of the cosmos is expansive. And we spend K through 12 building kids up on science literacy. We say we're going to start with little concepts and build. We do the same with math and reading, but with civics we don't. We treat it as this other thing where we dip in one time in middle school and again in high school. And so we could K through 12 layer it in a way that this didn't feel so overwhelming because it does feel overwhelming because we started at such a deficit to begin with.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:43:27] That's so true.
Lindsey Cormack [00:43:28] But I also think it doesn't have to be inhibiting to realize that everything is political. If anything, I think there's like a lot of power and agency in that. It's like, you know what, if everything's political, then I don't have accept how this is right now and it's something that's changeable. But I do hear you and I empathize with that because today I just taught state and local politics. And it's so many details for my students to have to hold onto. They're like, oh my God, there's this bicameral legislature at the federal level and we got to know New Jersey and there's the city council. And I was like, it wouldn't be that much to hold on to if we started a lot earlier with you, but it is a lot if we're giving it all to you as catch up, which is how most of us come to these topics.
Beth Silvers [00:44:07] Have you encountered in your research places where you think even if we do what I'm talking about, and we really get good at civics education, our government needs to simplify a little bit. I'll give you an example. I am on jury duty right now. And during orientation, they gave us this book that was titled You the Juror. And it includes a glossary, and it's pages and pages of legal terms. I went to law school and so I just breezed through it, but I was looking around thinking, wow, jury duty is a big lift. It's beautiful and it's important and incredible and somehow it works even though it's this complex; but should we do a better job like using words that people use in their everyday lives and not relying on CSI and Law and Order to give people the most comprehensive orientation to the criminal justice system that they have?
Lindsey Cormack [00:45:06] This is a great question and I'm glad you're doing jury duty, and I am glad you see it as something that you want to do because I think it truly is a privilege for individual citizens to be able to chart the way that our decisions happen in a judicial setting. It's like that's a great thing. Should it be simpler and easier? I think maybe. I think in the ways that I experience politics in the research that I do, which is mostly members of Congress sending direct communications to their constituents, I actually I think a lot of the federal stuff has come down in terms of how hard it is to understand it. I actually think a lot of the discourse in the last 15 years has come to a level of like we want people to understand what we're saying in plain language. When we're talking about technical procedures like what do you do on a jury, that's such a hard question for me to ask and answer because I imagine there's reasons to have these new terms that maybe you're not used to because you're in a special setting, you are in a legal setting with binding outcomes. So like it doesn't surprise me that there's stuff that's hard to understand there. But yeah, I guess, that makes it harder to engage for everyone. But I don't know that the answer is make the other side easier. I think it is recognizing the complexity of what we have and let's give due resources to understand this. Like when we look at K through 12, for every $50 we spend on STEM, we spend five cents on civics. That's just one of the starkest ways to think about how we're prioritizing things. And STEM does great stuff. I work at a STEM school, I love it. But that the counterbalance we've got to do a little bit more so that everyone's better equipped to understand these things.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:46:39] Well, and maybe the way to wrap up here is when we invite children into our civic culture, into the civic conversation, we are not just giving to them, but their participation, I'm getting a little teary, will absolutely be contributive. Let's not forget that the last time we had a constitutional amendment, it's because somebody got a bad grade on a paper in college and wanted to prove them wrong. So I'm wondering, as you've done all this work, what have you gotten as an educator? Like where do you hear kids say something and you go, right, I miss that. I miss the forest through the trees, which they are often so good at identifying.
Lindsey Cormack [00:47:29] I think something that children are amazing at is they are amazing at coming to problems without the prejudicial history that we have or the partisan lenses that we can't get out of. They can come to a new problem and say, like, is this fair? And their question of fairness is very much rooted in a personal sense of what seems to be okay to them. Whereas, we come at things with, like, did the Democratic party do this or did the Republican party say that? And so because they don't have that sort of background knowledge, they can come to these hard political issues with just such a neat set of understandings that's only based in their own little internal locus. Do they get always the right answers? Probably not. But I really love having conversations with kids like that because they have all the baggage of, like, is this what I'm supposed to say? Is this what my political leanings look at? And I do some conversations with my daughter where she'll talk to me about some policy issues and then we'll hear something like on the radio weeks later, she'd be like, oh man, I might be a Republican on this one. I thought I was a Democrat on that one. And that's because she doesn't know these things because it's not in her sort of media diet. And I love that about kids. They are problem solvers. They're just trying to make sense of their world. And so when we let them go on these topics or we ask them their opinions, there's insights in there. It's a neat thing about being a child.
Beth Silvers [00:48:53] Well, Lindsey, thank you so much for the book and for spending time with us talking about it and for being out there advocating for us to empower the future citizens of our country to do their best work in writing our country's story.
Lindsey Cormack [00:49:08] And Beth and Sarah, thank you for doing this work. I think the more people that are talking on this, the better. We need more attention on this, not less. So thank you.
Sarah Stewart Holland [00:49:16] Yes, thank you.
Beth Silvers [00:49:26] Thank you so much to Lindsey for talking with Sarah and me. Outside of Politics, Ellen, we just had a really fun weekend together. Do you want to talk about the four Broadway shows that we saw in two days this weekend?
Ellen [00:49:42] Yeah, I'm still tired because we got off the plane on the day that we were recording this. We just got off of the plane like an hour or two ago, so we are pretty tired. My ears haven't 100% popped yet, but it was a really fun weekend. So on Saturday we went to see Wicked and Hamilton. And then on Sunday we saw the Lion King and Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.
Beth Silvers [00:50:20] We did. It was very fun. We met my sister there and the three of us just shared a hotel room and pounded the pavement. We were just there for the two days and seeing these shows, Ellen, to me was very inspiring. How did you feel about it?
Ellen [00:50:37] I am very inspired. I am doing a play this summer. I am in a drama club camp type thing, so in the summer it's a day camp. And we'll do a play. And this play is Willy Wonka. And I really want to be Willy Wonka because I don't know any other character that I'd want to be. An Oompa Loompa would be fun, but I'm not short enough to do that. I think Willy Wonka would be really fun and these Broadway shows really inspired me.
Beth Silvers [00:51:20] What were you most surprised by? We've seen a lot of plays. We go to shows here in Cincinnati. So you have seen Broadway style productions before. What surprised you most about actually being in the theaters in New York City?
Ellen [00:51:37] The stages mostly because they were so different than in Cincinnati, because those are traveling plays that come. And in Broadway those shows stay at that theater, so the stage is so much cooler. For Wicked there's-- not trying to spoil. There's this thing called the Time Dragon-- and this isn't in the movie, so don't worry. And it's so cool on the stage. It's like this giant mechanical dragon and whenever something magical happens, like if Elphaba uses her powers-- Elphabas is the wicked witch of the West, if you didn't know already, which you probably did if you've seen Wicked. But whenever she uses her power, usually the dragon, the Tyne Dragon, will flap its wings and its eyes will glow red and it's so cool. Yeah, it's really cool.
Beth Silvers [00:52:44] You can do a lot more with a set that you've just built to live in that one theater than instead of doing a couple of shows in a city and then packing up and moving on.
Ellen [00:52:55] Yeah. So it's so much cooler.
Beth Silvers [00:52:58] Now you had never seen Hamilton live. What did you think?
Ellen [00:53:03] Oh my gosh, I love Hamilton so much. I cannot explain it, but I love the music and the characters. And I like how I'm also learning in terms of just absolutely enjoying something. When we saw Hamilton live, there was a different cast. And I was a little nervous at first because I knew that it wouldn't be as good as the original. But they were really, really good. And it was so cool live because it's the stage that I always saw when I watched Hamilton on Disney+. And it felt so, so cool. And they sang so well. And all of the characters have so much depth. And I just love it. I loved it so much.
Beth Silvers [00:53:56] I loved it, too. And I loved being there in this really big crowd of people. No one's on their phones, everyone's paying attention. They're excited to be there together. They cheer so loudly and the audience reacts to so many things. You can hear people groan and sigh and laugh and I just love being part of that.
Ellen [00:54:15] Yeah, it's so much fun. It's just so much cooler with a live audience.
Beth Silvers [00:54:21] So let's give people our rankings. We don't have to say anything bad about any of these shows because there wasn't anything bad. They were four spectacular, very, very different shows.
Ellen [00:54:32] So they were all amazing.
Beth Silvers [00:54:34] Yes. And in four very different theaters. It was cool to see the different theaters. But if you have to rank them, give us your four, three, two, one. So start with number four and then roll up to number one.
Ellen [00:54:47] My number four was The Lion King. The Lion king was great. It just did get a bit boring at times because-- no, it's not boring. It is a spectacular show. I already knew the entire story. There were songs and it was so cool. There were puppets. The songs were good. They added songs That weren't in the movie, but then they also had classics like The Circle of Life, I Just Can't Wait to Be King, Hakuna Matata, Can You Feel the Love Tonight? And it was great. It was really good. They had like giant puppets.
Beth Silvers [00:55:31] Puppet is even a hard word to use about it, right? It's almost like moving art pieces. That's breathtaking.
Ellen [00:55:37] Yes! And they actually go into the aisles and by the chairs. Not even just on the stage. There was an elephant coming down the aisle right next to us. It was crazy. There must have been like three people in there moving that thing. There was a rhino on the other side and there was this cool cart and it made it look like gazelles or something or antelopes were just, like, jumping and leaping across the savanna. Mom cried! She cried.
Beth Silvers [00:56:12] I did. I thought it was just really moving, Ellen. Honestly, because my job is to read the news every day and to really think about the news, there was just a part of me sitting there overwhelmed by the beautiful things that we can create when we work together. I was just thinking about all of the different people who were contributing to that gorgeous moment, who made those puppets, who were dancing and singing on stage, who were playing the drums, conducting the orchestra, running the lights, who wrote the script. I just sat there and I just got overwhelmed by what amazing things that we can do together. And I wish that we would always choose to create those moments that make you go, wow, instead of some of the ugly things that we do to each other. So, yes, I was teary during The Circle of Life for sure.
Ellen [00:57:00] Also, shout out to the actor who played Rafiki. She was so good.
Beth Silvers [00:57:05] Incredible.
Ellen [00:57:06] Just like if you threaten Rafiki, she will hit you with her stick.
Beth Silvers [00:57:13] So Lion King is your four even though you have all these things to say about it.
Ellen [00:57:19] Yeah. Also, shout out to the actor who played Scar, Stephen Carnell, that was his last performance as Scar in The Lion King because he's going to get to play Hades in the reimagined version of Hercules.
Beth Silvers [00:57:34] Yes, it was cool to see that. So we both agree that Lion King is our fourth, even though it was stunning and wonderful.
Ellen [00:57:40] Yeah, it was really good.
Beth Silvers [00:57:41] Because I agree with Ellen, you could probably cut 30, 40 minutes of that show and still it'd be wonderful. Okay, so what's your number three?
Ellen [00:57:49] My number three is Wicked. I love Wicked. I loved it so much. And I hadn't even seen the second act yet. I didn't know the story. And I loved it so much more on Broadway than I did in the movie. I felt like the actors I feel like I could like hear them better and I feel like they had more depth as characters on Broadway instead of just being like--Glinda, for example, I feel in the movie she's kind of just ditzy. Like I'm ditzy and I'm popular and I'm pink everything. And in the Broadway version she has feelings. She gets angry and upset and annoyed and mad. And she has her heart broken by Fiyero. And it's a lot better on Broadway. And in the second act, so much more was revealed. And I feel like I can't say anything because I don't want to spoil it to anyone. But so many cool things happened.
Beth Silvers [00:59:06] It is very cool. And I agree with you. I've seen Wicked a couple of times on stage, and this was by far the best Glinda I've ever seen. She was amazing.
Ellen [00:59:14] She was so good.
Beth Silvers [00:59:16] Okay, so what's your number two?
Ellen [00:59:18] My number two is Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. I can't even explain how cool this was. I just put my hands on my head right now in shock and I hit the microphone with my elbow. It's so, so, cool. It's so good. The characters are so likable and I've said this a million times. But they are so much more likable than in the movies and the actual books. Like Draco Malfoy's son, Scorpius-- if you're reading the books, I'm really, really sorry. I might be spoiling this a little bit. His son, his name is Scorpius, and he's so nice. He's actually nicer than Harry's son, Albus, named after Albus Dumbledore. And he's the best.
Beth Silvers [01:00:16] Ellen, you're laying down a very hot take here about likeability of the characters in this show versus in the books, because people who have read all the books multiple times adore those characters.
Ellen [01:00:27] Yes.
Beth Silvers [01:00:28] I do agree with you though that you instantly felt a connection and part of that is because you do adore those characters. And so it's exciting to see their adult lives and their kids in the next generation of all of this.
Ellen [01:00:39] Like Hermione was absolutely amazing as an adult. Minister of Magic. Come on.
Beth Silvers [01:00:49] Yeah, she was awesome. I have to say though that this show for me was my favorite of this trip because it felt unlike any live performance I've ever seen. I feel like it's hard to even categorize what it is. It's not a musical, but there's music in it that feels important to the movement of it.
Ellen [01:01:07] Yeah, and there's choreography when there's no songs.
Beth Silvers [01:01:11] Even when they're just changing the set, it feels like you're watching a dance.
Ellen [01:01:16] So stage crew, they wear all black because the lights will go out and they will move the props off the stage backstage. So there was a stage crew for this. So whenever the lights would go out, stage crew would come out and pull the stuff out. And you can see them like a little bit and you could see them on the show. They had capes.
Beth Silvers [01:01:42] They were the Hogwarts robes, right? They were wearing the robes.
Ellen [01:01:43] Yeah, they were literally Hogwarts robes. And they would like swoosh their capes and they would disappear.
Beth Silvers [01:01:51] It was like they were doing magic just to change the scenes.
Ellen [01:01:55] Yeah.
Beth Silvers [01:01:55] And I have to tell you I don't want to spoil any part of the show for people who haven't seen it yet. I was on the edge of my seat, leaning forward with my jaw open from the minute the curtain went up to the minute that it went down. There were so many parts of this that I have no clue how they did it, how they made it happen on stage. It was just so amazing to watch.
Ellen [01:02:18] The Dementors were really cool. We've got to talk about them. They were like so lifelike. We knew there had to be humans in at least two of them. Because someone even went out into the crowd. It was really cool. There was like writing on the walls.
Beth Silvers [01:02:35] Yeah, the stage just everything about it- amazing. I don't want to spoil a single thing.
Ellen [01:02:40] Fire came out of the wands.
Beth Silvers [01:02:41] Yeah, just incredible.
Ellen [01:02:43] They turned into flashlights and there was, like, a lake under the stage. Like, what the heck?
Beth Silvers [01:02:48] Incredible from start to finish. So that's my number one. But your number one is Hamilton, which we already talked about.
Ellen [01:02:55] Yes.
Beth Silvers [01:02:55] Ellen, as we wrap up here, if someone listening thinks, oh, I want to go do a Broadway weekend like this, do you have any recommendations, any tips?
Ellen [01:03:05] There's going to be long lines for these because the theaters usually don't open until like 30 or 40 minutes before the show even starts. If you don't already, you need to watch SNL's Big Dumb Line. Oh my gosh, it makes it so much more fun. We got in lines and we're like, look, it's a big dumb line. It's like a song and it's so funny.
Beth Silvers [01:03:36] It gave us the giggles instead of being annoyed about the lines. Anything else? Any other tips?
Ellen [01:03:42] If you want to go to a Broadway show or you're thinking about going to a Broadway show, bring someone with you. It's so much more fun and you get to have someone to discuss it to who has seen the show as well. It just makes it a lot better because it's kind of sad if you go by yourself. Also, it's expensive, so be careful. It's really expensive.
Beth Silvers [01:04:11] Well, Ellen, I think those are good tips. I would just add comfortable shoes a must.
Ellen [01:04:16] Oh, yes.
Beth Silvers [01:04:17] And you can do four shows in two days. It is very exhausting. It's a lot.
Ellen [01:04:21] It's exhausting.
Beth Silvers [01:04:22] But it's super fun. We're so lucky we got to do this trip.
Ellen [01:04:26] And you sleep a lot better.
Beth Silvers [01:04:28] And we're so lucky that my sister came with us. It was just a delightful weekend all around and we are happy.
Ellen [01:04:32] Also, get pizza if you go.
Beth Silvers [01:04:34] Go get pizza. We're also thrilled to be home now and Ellen I'm thrilled that you did this episode with me. Thank you so very much.
Ellen [01:04:40] Would anybody like to join my pickled mangoes company?
Beth Silvers [01:04:44] All right. I will be back with you on Friday with comedian Matt Ruby to talk about politics and comedy and how he thinks about comedy as a bellwether for politics. I'm super excited for that conversation.
Ellen [01:04:56] We love comedy.
Beth Silvers [01:04:57] We love comedy. Until then, everybody have the best week available to you.
Ellen [01:04:59] Bye.
I really appreciate everyone's kindness about Ellen. 💜
I’m 4 minutes in and have to stop to say that Ellen is always a delight to listen to.