A locked iron safe, sealed for a hundred years. Which objects did Americans choose to tell their story? “The Century Safe” was designed as a time capsule. In 1876, as America celebrated its 100th birthday, a group of citizens filled the safe with objects they trusted to tell the country’s story — to be opened

In January, Nieman Lab broke the story that major news publishers — including The New York Times, The Guardian, and USA Today Co. — had started blocking the Internet Archive due to concerns that AI companies might scrape the nonprofit’s repositories for training data.

No news publisher has confirmed to Nieman Lab that an AI company has already scraped their content from the Wayback Machine. Still, in the five months since we published our story the number of news sites blocking the Internet Archive has continued to rise.

Overwhelmingly, these sites are local news outlets.

McClatchy, Advance Local, Tribune Publishing and other major newspaper chains are restricting the nonprofit's archiving bots.

PORTLAND, Ore. — The downtown Saturday farmer's market is one of this city's bedrock institutions – a blocks-long parade of vendors and buskers in the shade of soaring elms.

And on a recent Saturday, gladhanding through it all, came a six-foot-tall talking pencil. "My name is Pencil," the pencil told an attendee, pressing a flyer into her hand. "I'm running for governor because we need to raise awareness about education."

"You're running as a pencil or a person?" the surprised woman asked.

"As a pencil."

Picture a smiling office supply store mascot: Pointy lead tip just above its bespectacled face. Big yellow barrel of a body. Pink eraser down around the knees.

Oregon's public schools rank last in fourth-grade reading, according to an analysis of national testing. As a wake-up call for elected leaders, Pencil is running for governor as a write-in candidate.

FORT COVINGTON, N.Y. — Rumors spread on social media over the winter: School kids with disabilities in the Salmon River Central School District, including Akwesasne Mohawk children, were being confined by special education teachers in wooden boxes. Sarah Konwahahawi Herne was devastated.

"It was so unfathomable that our children were seeing these boxes and hearing children screaming in these boxes," said Herne, a parent and a member of the tribal community. "I cried, I threw up and I immediately grabbed my laptop and said, What are we going to do?"

Local school officials later confirmed that at least two boxes had been built and used by staff in November and December of 2025. That disclosure sent more shockwaves through this region of small Upstate New York towns just south of the U.S.-Canada border, which includes the sprawling St. Regis Mohawk Reservation.

Sara Novic's new memoir is a story about motherhood and deaf history. NPR's Elissa Nadworny talks to Novic about her book, "Mother Tongue."

ELISSA NADWORNY, HOST:

Author Sara Novic is obsessed with language - its power, how it connects us and also how it can isolate us. Her latest book, a memoir, is called "Mother Tongue." In it, she chronicles losing her hearing at age 12, learning American Sign Language and finding a deaf community.

SARA NOVIC: (Through ASL translator) I feel like I'm always evolving, changing, and I think that's part of life as a deaf person.

NADWORNY: We're talking to Novic through an ASL translator. That's the voice you'll hear throughout our interview. Her story is one about motherhood, deaf history and how being deaf has shaped who she is and how she parents. 

U.S. school districts worry it could get even more expensive to prepare a meal under new federal dietary guidelines, as they also contend with cuts to programs that helped them buy local food.

On May 14, 2026, the three largest U.S. carriers announced a joint venture to pool spectrum for a unified direct-to-device (D2D) satellite platform. While the public narrative centers on rural coverage, this is a defensive restructuring of telecom power.

Satellite connectivity is scaling aggressively. SpaceX’s V3 satellites and Starship launches will soon drive a 10x capacity increase, while recent regulatory shifts have elevated Starlink from a vendor to a sovereign spectrum holder. Concurrently, Amazon’s acquisition of Globalstar gives the hyperscaler direct access to Apple’s D2D consumer market.

Far beyond eliminating dead zones, this JV marks a high-stakes power struggle between legacy Tier-1 operators and vertically integrated space titans for the control of next-generation communications.

Inside the coordinated push for standardization: How the 'Big Three' are turning the satellite revolution into a wholesale utility to shield their multi-billion-dollar billing engines.

The gangway up to the Empire State VII slopes from the dock at Fort Schuyler in the Bronx, where the East River meets the Long Island Sound. The ship is massive — 530 feet, nine decks - and it's being prepped for its annual summer teaching cruise.

Tom Murphy, SUNY Maritime College's Chief of Staff and a 1993 alumnus, has spent a lot of time on vessels at sea. But this one is different. "This is the first ship purposely built for training cadets," he said. "This isn't just a working ship, this is a school on water."

Cadets from the nation's Merchant Marine academies are finding lots of demand and great salaries because of a shortage of licensed mariners.

KNOX COUNTY, Tenn. (WATE) — Alex Haley’s book “Roots” is included in an updated list of book titles to be removed from Knox County Schools libraries.

The schools previously removed other books from shelves due to the Age-Appropriate Materials Act including “Water for Elephants,” “A Court of Thorns and Roses” and “A Clockwork Orange.”

The state passed the Age Appropriate Materials Act in 2022 requiring schools to have a list of materials in their libraries and to have a policy for reviewing them for age appropriateness.

Clark University has announced a plan to adapt to the changing competitive landscape of higher education and build long-term institutional strength, responding to unprecedented pressures from demographic and policy changes, as well as increasing costs.

The Clark Board of Trustees recently approved the strategic plan and an FY2026 budget that responds to the unprecedented pressures on institutions from national demographic changes impacting enrollment, increasing costs, policy changes, and uncertainty across higher education.

Clark’s approach responds to these pressures while creating transformative opportunities for students and deepening the University’s impact in addressing some of the world’s greatest challenges.

“All of higher education, Clark included, is at a critical inflection point,” said Clark University President David Fithian. “Rather than simply meet this challenging moment as an exercise in budget constraint, we have taken a longer view, leaning into current strengths and what is best about Clark to offer our students an even more compelling experience going forward.”

The plan involves:

From 75 campuses across 35 states, we've listened to hundreds of student entries to select the very best for NPR's College Podcast Challenge.

A student's personal narrative of what it's like to earn a college degree while at the same time raising a child. A look back at the rich sounds and music of a New York City neighborhood, recorded by a recording artist in the 1950s. Feelings of loss and displacement among the lifelong residents of a Georgia town when their community became a popular vacation hot spot.

These and other compelling stories, chosen from hundreds of entries we received this year, have been named the finalists in our fifth annual NPR College Podcast Challenge. In the coming days our judges will select from among these 10 podcasts our Grand Prize winner.

This application cycle, way more students reported test scores, up 10% compared with last year. That's despite many colleges having "test-optional" admissions policies.

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

During the pandemic, many colleges adopted test-optional admissions policies, meaning applicants did not have to submit SAT or ACT scores to get in. New research, though, shows many applicants are choosing to submit those scores anyway. J.D. Allen reports.

J D ALLEN, BYLINE: For 17-year-old Gracie Stuart (ph), the decision to take the ACT wasn't about meeting a college entrance requirement. It was about standing out. Stuart scored a 34 on the exam. The max score is a 36.

GRACIE STUART: When I saw my ACT score, I was honestly really excited.

ALLEN: Stuart played sports, volunteered at a local hospital and joined the Honor Society. Still, she felt submitting her scores was an important extra edge for the competitive applicant pool.

STUART: I felt they added another dimension to my application and helped reinforce my academic abilities.

A first-of-its-kind national study looks at the impacts of cell phone bans in schools.

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

More students than ever are going to schools where cellphones aren't allowed. More than two-thirds of states now have some restrictions, but are kids more focused? Are they learning more? A year ago, the National Bureau of Economic Research brought together academics from top universities to study these bans and highlight possible steps forward. This week, they issued their report. NPR's Sequoia Carrillo has been covering this and is with us now to tell us more about it. Good morning, Sequoia.

SEQUOIA CARRILLO, BYLINE: Good morning, Michel.

MARTIN: OK. There were a lot of reasons why lawmakers wanted to take away cellphones in schools - I mean, student mental health, engagement, but also as a fix to declining test scores. Did the study show that banning cellphones is succeeding?

CARRILLO: So yes and no. Are the bans doing what they set out to do? Absolutely, yes. The study found dramatically reduced cellphone activity in schools with restrictions. And teachers in states with bans also reported that the number of students using cellphones in class dropped on average from 61% to just 13% in three years. But the more complicated part here is student achievement.

Modern democracies have long recognized that commercial media are incapable of providing for all of society’s informational, cultural, and educational needs. For most healthy democracies, this systemic market failure has necessitated maintaining robust public media systems.

TAMPA — Florida Lt. Gov. Jay Collins unveiled his education agenda on Monday, which includes a rebuke of a proposal by one of his opponents in the Republican race for governor — U.S. Rep. Byron Donalds.

In April, Donalds said in a speech in Miami that he wants to “see that every child in the state has an individual learning plan, so we can chart their trajectory towards mastery by the time they graduate high school,” according to the Miami Herald.

Individual learning plans, or individualized education plans (IEPs), are traditionally used for students with special needs. An IEP is a written plan for the special education of students with disabilities.

Speaking before dozens of supporters during a press conference in Tampa Monday, Collins said “an IEP for everybody is not a good idea.”

AMHERST, Mass. — Crowding around an Amherst College campus fire pit, earnest-looking high school seniors offered fire-building suggestions as intently as if they were taking a final exam.

"This is our test of how rural you are," the college's assistant dean of admissions, Nathan Grove, joked before he finally got the neatly stacked logs to ignite so the group could make s'mores: "how good you are at making a fire."

Some of the nation's most selective institutions are slowly increasing their rural enrollment with the help of millions of dollars from a rural alumnus of the University of Chicago.

The Trump administration restored some of the billions of dollars previously frozen or withheld from research institutions and agencies. Some researchers say it's too late to save their work.

A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:

Science has taken a beating under President Trump. Last year, the administration tried to freeze or withhold billions of dollars to major research institutions and agencies. Some of that money has been restored, but as NPR's Katia Riddle reports, some researchers say it's too late to save their work.

KATIA RIDDLE, BYLINE: There's a laboratory at Harvard that now stands empty, except on this day for Professor Sean Eddy. He is the head of this lab and one of the few researchers who survived last year's cuts.

SEAN EDDY: Seeing these labs empty is - this is not the way it's supposed to be. This was a very vibrant lab.

The education secretary faced questions about the shrinking of her agency, limits on federal student loan borrowing and oversight of the education of students with disabilities.

The new study in JAMA Network Open also finds that more parents leave their guns loaded and unlocked when they have teenagers, despite the fact that suicide risk goes up for this age group.

Remember those devastating learning losses that began during the pandemic? Turns out, they began years before COVID-19. Some states are finally turning things around.

The pandemic-era backslide in math and reading scores for students across the U.S. was not a sudden catastrophe but the continuation of a brutal, decade-long "learning recession" that began years before COVID-19's arrival. That's according to the latest Education Scorecard, an annual deep-dive into student data from The Educational Opportunity Project at Stanford University and Harvard University's Center for Education Policy Research.

The new Scorecard, released Wednesday and in its fourth year, offers several revelations for families, educators and policymakers looking for clarity — and hope — at a time when public education has been blamed and battered for those persistent declines in student performance.

Many Americans only know the history of anger and tension with Iran. But an archaeologist who has spent 45 years focusing on Iran says it is worth recalling the time when the countries were friends.

The British- and American-backed plot to overthrow Iran’s prime minister in 1953 laid the groundwork for the 1979 Iran hostage crisis and decades of hostility with the U.S. that have now culminated in a war launched on Iran by the U.S. and Israel.

Many Americans only know the anger and tension with Iran that has grown from those roots set down during the middle of the last century. But as an archaeologist who has spent over 50 years specializing in Iran, and from my research on Iranian history in the context of changes undergone by Iran’s nomadic population through time, I believe it is worth recalling the time when the two countries had a distinctly different relationship.

PENSACOLA, Fla. — At the kitchen table at their rental condo in Florida, Dick and Kathy McCaskill were working on coloring in an elaborate star, one of the few unfinished designs in the adult coloring book they've been working on.

This year's winner in NPR's College Podcast Challenge is a letter to a grandparent that grapples with health issues including dementia. It's the story of a family learning to talk about hard things.

"We love to do this," said Kathy, 77, laughing as she picked up a dark blue colored pencil. "I married a blue girl," Dick, 76, said. Coloring helps Kathy with her dementia, calming her anxiety and helping stimulate cognition.

Their grandson, Colby McCaskill, was visiting from New York, where he's finishing up his senior year at Fordham University. He grabbed a gold colored pencil and joined them. "How long have you been working on this coloring book?" he asked his grandmother. "A lot of time," she said, laughing. "I love doing it."

Smith College is one of the largest women's colleges in the country. This week, the Trump administration announced it is investigating the school's practice of admitting trans women.

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

One of the nation's largest women's colleges is now under scrutiny by the Trump administration. Smith College in western Massachusetts began admitting transgender women in 2015. This week, the U.S. Education Department announced it would investigate the legality of that practice. From member station WFCR, New England Public Media's Nirvani Williams reports.

NIRVANI WILLIAMS, BYLINE: It's finals week at Smith College, and the walkways across campus are covered with chalk drawings of the transgender pride flag and the phrase, trans Smithies belong.

UNIDENTIFIED STUDENT: As a trans woman in the United States, I don't feel safe at all.

School systems of every size have been hit by cyberattacks. "It's not Johnny in his room trying to break in and change his grades anymore," says one superintendent. 

Scott Elder has a pretty typical morning routine. He wakes up at 7 a.m., drinks coffee and feeds the dogs, Bella (a rat terrier) and Spencer (a Chihuahua). But on Jan. 12, 2022, Elder's routine was interrupted by a concerning phone call.

Elder is the superintendent of Albuquerque Public Schools in New Mexico, and the call came from his district's IT department, saying they had found some sort of computer virus.

He recalls thinking, "Oh, we've got a bug in the system and they found it so they'll just kill it and we'll be done, right?"

The bug was in the student records system. So Elder's IT staff shut that network down. But that meant teachers wouldn't have access to basic information about the almost 70,000 students enrolled in New Mexico's largest school district. Educators couldn't take attendance, wouldn't know children's bus routes and were locked out of grading systems.