Mitch Prinstein examines how our popularity affects our success, our relationships, our happiness, and why we don’t always want to be the most popular. Mitch is the John Van Seters Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience and the director of clinical psychology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is the author of the book Popular: Finding Happiness and Success in a World That Cares Too Much About the Wrong Kinds of Relationships.

Adriana Figueroa and Maggie Loredo's stories illuminate the compelling historical, ethical, and political challenges unfolding today on the U.S. Mexican border.

Both women were born in Mexico. Because their families were undocumented, both returned to Mexico in order to continue their education.

They are part of a growing number of young people who have had to make the same decision.

Both women are part of a group that is helping other young returnees find their footing in Mexico. They have also had an impact on policies affecting young people there.

Maggie and Adriana were on Duke’s campus as part of a series called Connect2Politics, a leadership initiative for Duke undergraduates interested in political engagement. The initiative is run by the Hart Leadership Program.

Researchers know that prekindergarten offers short term benefits - kids do better in the early grades if they’ve gone to Pre-K. But the effects seem to fade by about the third grade. In this episode: new research into this fade out effect.

Researchers paired student data from a statewide Pre-K experiment with records of teacher observation scores from Tennessee’s new formal evaluation program. Their idea was a simple one - would a student’s access to high-quality early grade teachers help the Pre-K effects last longer?

Guest: Walker Swain, University of Georgia

Guest Host: Anna Gassman-Pines, Duke Center for Child & Family Policy

The so-called “migrant caravan” has grabbed worldwide headlines. Approximately 3,000 people are walking toward the Southern U.S. border from a variety of countries. The caravan appears to have originated in Honduras, and the travelers say they are headed north for many reasons including fear of violence and gangs in their home countries. Many questions surround who the migrants are, and how the U.S. should deal with them.

Sarah Bermeo has been following the situation closely. She is a political economist at the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University with expertise in foreign policy, development and migration. Bermeo is author of the book, Targeted Development – Industrialized Country Strategy in a Globalizing World.

Earlier this week, a gunman opened fire at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh. Authorities say the gunman made hateful, anti-Semitic comments on social media before the attack. David Schanzer is Director of the Duke Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security. He calls the attack an act of “Trumpism-inspired Terrorism."

Sari Kaufman is a junior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland Florida. Her high school was the site of a horrific mass shooting this year. Since the shooting, Kaufman has worked alongside her friends to register thousands of voters.

Sari Kaufman was on Duke’s campus to participate in a panel discussion about the challenges to student voting rights. The event was part of a special series run by the Hart Leadership Program called Connect2Politics. The series is exposing students to a new generation of young political leaders. Gunther Peck, director of the Hart Leadership Program, is our guest host.

You might expect that elderly people would have more wealth than families with kids because they're older and they’ve had more time to save. But Christina Gibson-Davis' research shows the gap in wealth between the two groups has grown "startlingly wide" over the past 25 years.

Gibson-Davis is a faculty member at the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University.

Michael Sorrell is president of Paul Quinn College, and he has turned the historically black institution in Dallas into what he calls “an engine of social mobility.” He became president of Paul Quinn in 2007. At the time there were more than a dozen abandoned buildings on campus.

Michael Sorrell has since been named HBCU President of the Year three times for his contributions to higher education, and this year he was named to Fortune’s List of the World’s 50 Greatest Leaders.

Leaders in towns and cities affected by Hurricane Florence are attempting to get operations running again. Soon they will likely be thinking about how their communities can do things differently so the next big weather event doesn’t cause as many problems.

Elizabeth Albright studies how communities recover after devastating natural disasters. For one research project, she followed seven Colorado communities for three years following deadly floods there. She joins Judith Kelley to talk about what she learned.

Yemen is in the midst of civil war, a brutal conflict that has caused the world’s worst humanitarian crisis according to the United Nations. By some estimates, 75 percent of the people there are in need of humanitarian assistance. Millions have been forced to flee, and more are at risk of starvation. Abby Maxman, president of Oxfam America, recently returned from a trip to Yemen. She visited camps for displaced people, and has returned to the U.S. determined to help.

Kelly Brownell has stepped away from his role as dean of the Sanford School of Public Policy to launch a new World Food Policy Center at Duke University. He talks with the school's new dean, Judith Kelley, about key challenges that he hopes his new center will begin to address.

For example, he hopes to get people in the food and food policy space talking to each other. The academic field is segmented, he says. "There is a lot of depth around particular topics but not much breadth across them and very little communications across them."

It’s often said that one in 10 people on the planet is hungry, and that number is on the rise. Abigail Bennett is the lead author of a new report from Duke University’s World Food Policy Center, The Environmental Defense Fund, the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions and the Duke University Marine Lab on the contribution of fisheries to food and nutrition security. Abby has served as a fellow at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and is a consultant at the World Bank.

Researchers now believe they can predict bad behavior later in life, just from a child's behavior and life circumstances as a toddler. This is the last of a four-part series looking at early childhood.

Guest: Daniel Shaw of the Center for Parents and Children and the Pitt Parents and Children Laboratory at the University of Pittsburgh.

There's an intriguing new study that shows a connected between when low-income families receive supplemental nutrition, or SNAP assistance, and student test scores. The study is believed to be the first to show a connection between benefits of this sort and academic performance.

The authors of the study are Anna Gassman-Pines and Laura Bellows. Gassman-Pines is an Associate Professor of Public Policy, Psychology, and Neuroscience at Duke University. Laura Bellows is a doctoral student at the Sanford School of Public Policy.

It's becoming more and more apparent that the first thousand days of a child's life are crucial. In particular, the nutrition a child receives early in life dictates the kind of life that child will go on to have. But around the world, many women face huge obstacles when it comes to securing proper nutrition for their families.

Journalist Roger Thurow traveled the world to see firsthand the challenges many mothers face as a part of an exploration of a worldwide initiative to end early childhood malnutrition. He met new mothers and babies in Uganda, India, Guatemala, and Chicago, and tells their stories in the book The First Thousand Days: A Crucial Time for Mothers and Children - And the World.

Most experts recommend mothers breastfeed for six months exclusively after birth – but most women don’t do so. In the U.S.. only 27 percent of mothers reach the 6-month mark. In the U.K., it’s less than one percent. Professor Rafael Pérez-Escamilla of the Yale School of Public Health has been working on a way to boost and sustain breastfeeding rates – and he’s doing it on a country-by-country basis.

“The tragic Parkland, Fla., shooting on February 14th is yet another dreadful reminder that schools are no sanctuary against mass violence. Americans are surely united in wanting reforms … But the reform that is getting the most attention in this bizarro era we live in — arming teachers with concealed handguns — would likely make things worse.” – excerpt from an op-ed by one of this country’s preeminent researchers on gun violence in America, Philip J. Cook.

Cook talks with Kelly Brownell about other, more promising strategies for dealing with gun violence in classrooms than arming teachers.

It's March Madness, but instead of basketball, we’re pitting U.S. presidents from throughout the ages against each other. Who will be crowned the best president?  Will it be Washington or Honest Abe?  Maybe FDR?  What criteria should we be using to determine what makes a great president? Guests include Frederick "Fritz" Mayer and BJ Rudell from POLIS, the Duke Center for Political Leadership, Innovation & Service.
Music: Blue Dot Sessions

James Clapper served as director of national intelligence and Obama’s top security adviser from 2010-2017. He oversaw 200,000 intelligence employees, a $52 billion budget and top security organizations including the CIA, NSA and FBI. In this episode of Policy 360, he discusses threats to the U.S., his decision to speak out against the country's current leadership and his hopes for future leaders.

Music: Blue Dot Sessions/Creative Commons

It’s estimated that 1.2 billion people around the world live without electricity. Another billion have only limited access to electricity. And billions more lack access to clean fuel and technology for cooking. There's an exciting new project designed to address the energy needs of the world’s poor. The Energy Access Project aims to bring an interdisciplinary approach to one of the world's most vexing issues.

In recent years, oil and gas production in the U.S. has increased dramatically, in part because of new technology like hydraulic fracturing or “fracking." Proponents say fracking is helping the country be energy independent. Opponents cite environmental concerns. Daniel Raimi traveled to every major U.S. oil and gas- producing region in the U.S. His book is called The Fracking Debate.

Recently, Jonathan Mattingly has been a detective of sorts, delving into partisan gerrymandering in North Carolina. (Gerrymandering is when one party manipulates voting districts for their own gain.) Mattingly is chair of the math department at Duke and his mathematical analysis of the state’s 13 Congressional districts was used in a court ruling that declared the state's maps unconstitutional. He says what he uncovered in his research could be used to address gerrymandering in other states.

A panel of federal judges recently declared North Carolina's Congressional maps unconstitutional. (Congressional maps divide the state into voting districts.) The maps had been drawn by Republicans and tilted heavily in their favor. The ruling required lawmakers to redraw the maps by the end of January 2018, but the U.S. Supreme Court has put that ruling on hold.

Recently Tom Ross ran a bipartisan simulation which demonstrated how independent redistricting in the state might work. Lessons learned in North Carolina could be applied to other states who are grappling with these issues.

Tom Ross is president of the Volcker Alliance, which is working to rebuild public trust in government. He is the first Terry Sanford Distinguished Fellow at the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University.

The algorithms that determine what we see on social media platforms wield a lot of power, especially when it comes to the news that people see. Facebook made big news recently when the company tweaked its algorithm. And did you know some real news stories are not written by humans, but by smart algorithm?

Kelly Brownell discusses the promise and peril of algorithms with Phil Napoli. Napoli was recently awarded a fellowship by the Carnegie Corporation of New York to explore this topic more closely.

Phil Napoli's upcoming book is titled "Media Technocracy: The Rise of Algorithmic News and the Future of the Marketplace of Ideas."

Recently, the Charlotte Observer ran a powerful five-part series that revealed shocking practices inside the state’s prison system. The investigation exposed correctional officers running contraband rings and collaborating with gang members. As a result of that series, the state commissioned a study to see whether best practices from other state prison systems could be implemented in North Carolina. The authors of the study, Caitlin Saunders and Joel Rosch, discuss their findings.