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Common Academic Experience – “Sold a Story”

Clark is excited to welcome a special guest to campus to lead our incoming undergraduate students in our Common Academic Experience for 2024

As we welcome you to Clark and the life of a college student, we invite you to participate in the Common Academic Experience with your incoming class. This year’s program is framed around the podcast Sold a Story – a piece of investigative journalism that explores the science of how children learn to read, and how our education system has been slow to embrace effective teaching and learning practices based on science. The series uncovers why and how this happened, with complex causes and effects that raise questions about science and belief systems, psychology, politics, history, race and socioeconomic disparities, storytelling, and the role of university. We will use the podcast to open the door to critical thinking about how learning works in general.

Sold a Story was the #2 most-shared show on Apple Podcasts in 2023 and #3 on Time Magazine’s top podcasts of the year. It has won numerous honors including a duPont, an Edward R. Murrow and a Peabody nomination.

Host and producer Emily Hanford will participate in a special discussion session during orientation on Sunday, August 25th.

True to Clark’s motto, Emily Hanford’s work challenges conventions about how teaching and learning works, and she has been effective in changing our world, with an impact sweeping the nation by getting schools to re-think their approaches.

an image of a young boy reading a book against a white and yellow background. There is red text that reads Sold a Story

How to Listen

There are 6 main episodes of the podcast released at the end of 2022. There are also 4 bonus episodes released in 2023 and 2024 that describe the impact of the reporting from Sold a Story. Please listen to the first 6 episodes but if you get hooked and want to hear about the aftermath, feel free to keep going!

The Official Website

Apple Podcasts

Spotify

Suggested ways to engage

  • Listen while driving, taking a walk, working out.
  • Listen during a trip/vacation.
  • Listen before going to sleep.
  • Try to avoid listening while scrolling your phone or watching tv.
  • After each episode – write a note to yourself about something that surprised you, was new to you, challenged an assumption, or made you upset.