As AI increasingly permeates all facets of modern life, we will be bombarded with new challenges at the same time we’re reeling from the challenges that have resulted from widespread adoption of smartphones and the proliferation of social media and online gaming that have, collectively, handicapped our youth.

In an attempt to add conservative viewpoints to its news coverage, NBC recently announced that former Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair, Ronna McDaniel, would join the network as a regular commentator. And then it fired her less than a week after her first appearance.

This summer JPR welcomes James Kelley, our sixth intern in the program. James joins JPR from Oregon State University where he was the city editor of OSU’s student-led publication, the Daily Barometer and where he hosted a radio show on KBVR FM. JPR News Director Erik Neumann spoke with James, who will be arriving in Ashland this June.

A recent episode of Underground History highlighted one archaeologist’s effort to share the wonders of our National Park System in a new way: not through words, but with LEGO vignettes.

By now, you have probably heard that I will be retiring as the host of First Concert at the end of June. It has been an amazing experience for me to discover and share with you so much beautiful music that I was unfamiliar with and enlarge the catalog of classical music here at JPR.

In early February an email arrived from NPR announcing Linda Wertheimer’s retirement. Wertheimer has been an NPR icon for over five decades and, along with Susan Stamberg, Nina Totenberg, and the late Cokie Roberts, was crowned one of NPR’s “founding mothers” in the 2021 bestseller Susan, Linda, Nina & Cokie: The Extraordinary Story of the Founding Mothers of NPR by Lisa Napoli.

I/O is the tenth studio album by English singer-songwriter and musician Peter Gabriel, released December 2023 through Real World Records.

It’s another presidential election year and a reminder that our country still doesn’t have a secure, nationwide e-voting system even following all the turmoil of the 2020 election. We have developed all the technologies we need in order to achieve this―data encryption, two-factor and biometric authentication, smartphones, smart cards, cloud computing, high-speed fiber optic connectivity―and yet here we are, four years later, with the same system.

This past September, a coalition of 22 donors announced a national initiative to strengthen communities and democracy by supporting local news and information with an infusion of more than a half-billion dollars over the next five years.

The following are headlines from a few local news sites on a recent Sunday. In Ashland: “City Council to vote on camping ordinance, consider funding to extend emergency shelter operation.” In Medford: “Medford council worries about draining last federal dollars to help homeless people.” In Grants Pass: “Parents, superintendent want fence between school and homeless campers.” Besides all being about homelessness, there’s another similarity in these stories. None talked about the lack of housing in the Rogue Valley.