Well Said

It's estimated that nearly 30 million Americans will have an eating disorder at some point in their lives. But eating disorders are still an issue mostly kept quiet. In this week's episode, we talk about eating disorders and National Eating Disorder Awareness Week with Cynthia Bulik, the director of the UNC Center of Excellence for Eating Disorders and the director of the Center for Eating Disorders Innovation at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden.

Self-regulation skills in childhood can be predictors of long-term outcomes from economic success to risks for substance use. Fortunately, they are skills that can be taught in the classroom the same way schools teach literacy. In this week's episode, we're talking about why self-regulation is important and how to teach the skills with Desiree Murray, a senior research scientist and associate director of research at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, who recently published a report on self-regulation as part of a collaboration with researchers at Duke's Center for Child and Family Policy.

The maker movement is in full force at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Carolina's Be a Maker Network is connecting students, faculty and staff to design and create physical objects in makerspaces equipped with tools for woodworking, metalworking and digital fabrication. In this week's podcast, we talk about the maker movement at Carolina with Rich Superfine, the Taylor-Williams Distinguished Professor of Physics, Astronomy and Applied Sciences, and the director of the Be a Maker Network.

When Jim Ketch founded the Carolina Jazz Festival 40 years ago as a small Music Department event, the goal was to give his students a chance to rub shoulders with professional musicians. In the decades that followed, the festival morphed into a much larger event, inspiring not just Carolina students but high schoolers from across the state. This year, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill will celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Carolina Jazz Festival from Feb. 15 to 18. In this week's episode, we talk about the history of the Carolina Jazz Festival and the upcoming 40th anniversary of the event with Ketch, a music professor and the director of jazz studies at Carolina.

When Carol Ann McCormick began sorting through the thousands of fungal specimens stored at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Herbarium, she was shocked by what she found. Included in the collection, which had fallen into disarray throughout the years, were fungal specimens collected the renowned botanist George Washington Carver. Born into slavery, Carver developed techniques to help repair soil damaged by cotton plantings, and taught at the Tuskegee Institute for nearly 50 years. In this week's episode, we talk about Carver's fungal specimens with McCormick, the herbarium's curator, and Van Cotter, a retired industrial mycologist who volunteers at the herbarium.

For more than 40 years, Carolina alumnus Sheldon Peck and his wife, Leena, have been building an art collection full of 17th-century Flemish drawings by masters like Rembrandt van Rijn, Pieter Paul Rubens, Jacob Jordaens and Paul Bril. As of today, 134 masterpieces of that collection are now part of the Ackland Art Museum after the Peck's donated the collection — valued at $17 million — as part of an overall $25 million donation to the museum. In this week's episode, we talk with Sheldon Peck about the collection and role the fine arts play in modern society.

With the inauguration just a few days away, the presidential transition of power is in the limelight. In this week’s episode, we talk about the complex transition process with associate professor of political science Terry Sullivan. Sullivan is also the executive director of the White House Transition Project, which helps prepare the incoming president and their administration for the daunting task ahead of them.

People are always trying to be more creative. But is it a learned trait or are some people just wired to be more creative than others? In this week's episode, we talk about creativity and how people can hone the skill with R. Keith Sawyer, the Morgan Distinguished Professor in Educational Innovations from the UNC School of Education.

In the past several decades, HIV has gone from being a death sentence to a virus manageable with medications. With the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill becoming a hub for HIV research, Carolina's labs have helped push that progress along. In this week's episode, we're talking about Carolina's HIV research with Mike Cohen, Yeargan-Bate Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology and Epidemiology, and the director of the Institute for Global Health and Infectious Diseases.

The massive increase of tourists visiting Ecuador's Galapagos Islands is bringing a new set of challenges for the islands' ecosystem. In this week's episode, we discuss the impact the increase in tourism is having on the islands and what it means for the future of its renowned wildlife with Steve Walsh, the Lyle V. Jones Distinguished Professor of Geography and director of Carolina's Center for Galapagos Studies.

As news organizations continue to pay closer attention to the bottom dollar of the business, the fate of local newspapers and community journalism hangs in the balance. In this week's episode, Penny Muse Abernathy, the Knight Chair in Journalism and Digital Media Economics at the UNC School of Media and Journalism, discusses her recently released report “The Rise of a New Media Baron and the Emerging Threat of News Deserts," and how many communities could soon become "news deserts" by losing their of local news.

After months of campaigning, the 2016 Election is over and the United States has a new president-elect. In this week's episode, we take a dive into the demographics that impacted the results with Thomas Carsey, the Thomas J. Pearsall Distinguished Professor in the Department of Political Science and the Director of the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science.

They're promoted as a safer alternative to smoking, but e-cigarettes may be posing its own serious health risks. In this week's episode, Ilona Jaspers, the director of the toxicology program at the UNC School of Medicine, discusses the how inhaling the vaporized flavored liquids is altering genes important to the immune system.

With the World Series underway, we're talking with major league baseball insider — and Carolina junior — Chris Cotillo. As a high schooler outside Boston, Cotillo launched a career in sports reporting with the simple creation of a Twitter account, @ChrisCotillo. Now he's a student in the UNC School of Media and Journalism, honing the skills of the field while juggling a budding career and the classroom. In this week's podcast, Cotillo discusses the start of his journalism career, balancing reporting and school, and his World Series prediction.

Jodi Magness hasn't just studied history with books. She's dug it up herself. The Kenan Distinguished Professor for Teaching Excellence in Early Judaism from the College of Arts and Sciences, Magness has spent her career working on archaeological excavations to better understand the history of ancient Palestine. In this week's episode, Magness talks about the importance of archaeology and her work at Huqoq in Israel, where crews have uncovered unique mosaics. Learn more about Magness' work at Huqoq and find out how students can work on the excavation at Huqoq.org.

College football was once far behind the NBA and MLB in popularity. But not anymore. Right below the NFL, college football has become the second most popular sport in the United States. And the rise of college football has changed more than just the sport. In this week’s episode, we talk with sports administration professor Jonathan Jensen about how businesses like Nike, Under Armor and Adidas tapping into college football's rise.

For four decades, PlayMakers Repertory Company has been a staple at Carolina, bringing world-class actors and directors to campus. Based in the College of Arts and Sciences, PlayMakers is the professional theater in residence at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and has become North Carolina's premier resident professional theater company. As the company celebrates its 40th anniversary, we talk with Producing Artistic Director Vivienne Benesch about PlayMakers' storied history and its future.

The traditional one-size-fits-all mentality in business and the workplace just isn't cutting it in the United States anymore. Aging baby boomers and adjustments to immigration laws are rapidly changing the country's demographics and creating major challenges for companies. We're talking about those disruptive demographics with James Johnson, William R. Kenan Distinguished Professor of strategy and entrepreneurship at Kenan-Flagler Business School and director of the Urban Investment Strategies Center in the Frank Hawkins Kenan Institute of Private Entrepreneurship.

Carolina’s classrooms are changing. Professors Kelly Hogan and Viji Sathy are transforming theirs to be more interactive and inclusive — an effort that has helped overcome achievement gaps. This week, we’re talking about the teaching innovation with Hogan, a senior STEM lecturer and the director of instructional innovation at the College of Arts and Sciences, and Sathy, Special Projects Assistant to the Senior Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education and a senior lecturer in the department of Psychology and Neurosciences.

Political campaigns are transforming as social media creates new ways for politicians to reach voters and showcase their platform. From well-timed tweets to digital missteps, social media has become a game-changer for politicians running for office. In this week's episode, we're talking politics and social media Daniel Kreiss, School of Media and Journalism associate professor and author of Prototype Politics: Technology-Intensive Campaigning and the Data of Democracy.