COVID-19 Update, Pandemic Language, SCOTUS Sketches

Top of Mind with Julie Rose

Answers to Your COVID Mutation and Vaccine Questions (0:30) The virus that causes COVID-19 has mutated to become more contagious. Meanwhile, the number of people in the US who’ve been vaccinated against COVID-19 is lower than officials had hoped we’d see by now. Stephen Goldstein, an evolutionary virologist at the University of Utah, has the answers to our COVID-19 questions. Why English Learners with Disabilities are Widely Neglected in Schools (21:03) One out of every six students learning English as a second language in American schools also has a learning disability, but often they get only special education assistance–without targeted English language assistance. Why do schools short these students of the service they’re entitled to? Sara Kangas is a Special Education Program Professor at Lehigh University. Will the Pandemic Change How We Speak? (37:17) Not only has the COVID-19 pandemic introduced new words into our vocabulary–like "social distancing"–it also might be changing the way we speak. Michigan State University researchers are studying this through a project called “MI Diaries,” and sociolinguistics professor Betsy Sneller is heading that project. Over-the-Counter Hearing Aids (52:21) It's a complicated–not to mention expensive–process to get hearing aids: you have to go to an audiologist and get a prescription, with the whole deal costing nearly $5,000. Congress actually passed a law to make hearing aids available over the counter, but the FDA is behind in creating the specific rules for the new law. Frank Lin is the director of the Cochlear Center for Hearing and Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. Supreme Court Sketch Artists Follow Oral Arguments as They Go Virtual (1:10:32) Sketch artist Art Lien has long helped the public see inside the Supreme Court with his pencil and watercolors–even when the oral arguments before the Supreme Court went virtual. Art Lien contributes sketches to NBC News and SCOTUSblog. Changes in US Disaster Preparation (1:32:23) 2020 broke records for the cost of damage done by natural disasters. Is there a way to bring down that price tag? Allison Reilly, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of Maryland, is the leading the Day One Project.