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When Gail Christopher, executive director of the National Collaborative for Health Equity and a Mason senior scholar, talks about “ensuring a future,” she’s really talking about creating a system of equity that produces opportunities for everyone to “actualize their potential.”

Are the midterm elections the most consequential of our time? Maybe, maybe not. Jennifer Victor, associate professor of political science in Mason’s Schar School of Policy and Government and Mason president Gregory Washington wrestle with that, and you might be surprised at the answer. Want more surprises? Then hear why high voter turnout could be a double-edged sword for our democracy.

Dr. Michael Nickens, an associate professor of music at Mason, explains how he transforms from his mild-mannered persona into Doc Nix, the flamboyant leader of the Green Machine, the nation’s No. 1 pep band. Actor Bill Murray is a fan of the band, and Nix is pretty good on the tuba.

Alpaslan Özerdem, dean of the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution explains the keys to effective peacebuilding, whether it concerns the war in Ukraine, gun violence or local issues. And don’t miss the discussions about how an alien invasion could help mend the rift between Russia and the West.

Rep. Cori Bush, Missouri's first Black congresswoman, is teaching at Mason this summer. A pastor, teacher, nurse, and a Black Lives Matter activist in Ferguson, Mo., Bush talks about her most her unusual, and activist, path to Congress. “There is always someone to help, something to give,” she says. And she doesn’t flinch discussing controversial issue around race and policing.

Louise Shelley, a University Professor and director of Mason’s Terrorism, Transnational Crime and Corruption Center, explains the connections between Russia’s war in Ukraine and corruption and organized crime, and how criminals and terrorists take advantage of the globalized world in which we live.

Jim Trefil, a Mason physicist and Robinson Professor, explains the importance of a scientific worldview. The author of more than 50 books and one of the developers of the modern theories about quarks as a fundamental component of the universe, Trefil is helping pioneer a new way of teaching science.

Larry Pfeiffer, director of Mason’s Michael V. Hayden Center for Intelligence, Policy, and International Security explains Vladimir Putin’s real agenda in Ukraine and why China is taking notes. He also asks Americans to guard against autocracy at home because, as he said, it doesn’t take much for a country's values to be subverted and freedoms suppressed.

Charles Chavis, an assistant professor of conflict resolution and history, and director of African and African American studies, talks about his new book that explores the lynching of a young Black man in Salisbury, Md, and how understanding his story and the Black experience can help find the right ways to fight anti-Black violence today.

Ted Dumas, an associate professor of psychology and an experienced researcher, reveals foods we are losing to climate change, how a pooping bear in Japan can help keep cherries from extinction, and that if we do nothing about the climate, most of the US could be uninhabitable by 2100.