Jim Barksdale’s $100 million gift 25 years ago changed the course of Mississippi public education. He gives an update on this historic gift which has helped children learn to read not only in his home state, but also, through Reading Universe (a service of WETA/Reading Rockets, the Barksdale Reading Institute, and First Book), in other U.S. states and foreign countries. Llewellyn King and Adam Clayton Powell III co-host.

The threat from wildfire is growing and prescribed burning — the controlled application of fire to a specific area of land to achieve defined management objectives — is an important and traditional tool for maintaining healthy ecosystems and reducing wildfire risks. J. Morgan Varner, director of research and senior scientist at Tall Timbers in Tallahassee, Florida, discusses prescribed burning with Host Llewellyn King and Co-host Adam Clayton Powell III.

The consensus among AI savants is that 2027 will be a key year — a year in which AI achieves some degree of “sentience”: It won’t want to be shut down, for example. The HAL scenario, in the film “2001: A Space Odyssey” is coming. But Jeffrey Cole, director of the USC Annenberg Center for the Digital Future, is mostly “positive,” about the fast march of AI. He speaks with Host Llewellyn King and Co-host Adam Clayton Powell III.

Batteries are powering our future, from electric vehicles to data centers. There is a growing need for energy storage, and there are advances in battery technology. Host Llewellyn King and Co-host Adam Clayton Powell III discuss the “essentiality” of batteries with Clinton Vince, chair of the U.S. Energy Practice at Dentons, the world’s largest law firm, and John Howes, founder and principal at Redland Energy Group.

Public broadcasting “isn’t going away” with the Trump cuts, Co-host Adam Clayton Powell III says reassuringly in this week’s episode. Powell, who held managerial posts at NPR, PBS and CBS, and Host Llewellyn King take a look back at public broadcasting and offer a way forward.

Weather forecasting is crucial for utility companies, impacting everything from demand forecasting to storm readiness and renewable energy integration. David Naylor, who heads Rayburn Electric Cooperative, which serves the Dallas metroplex, and Hansi Singh, a scientist and co-founder and CEO of Planette, Inc., a weather forecaster, join Host Llewellyn King and Co-host Adam Clayton Powell III.

The betting on a fusion-powered future is heating up with Google’s deal to purchase 200 megawatts of power from Commonwealth Fusion Systems planned fusion power plant in Chesterfield County, Virginia. Rick Needham, chief commercial officer of Commonwealth Fusion Systems, who struck the deal with the tech giant, speaks with Host Llewellyn King and Co-host Adam Clayton Powell III.

Harvey Castro is an emergency room doctor whose fascination with the potential of AI in healthcare led him to be an early adopter of the technology and a proponent through TEDx Talks, and books, including the just-released “Critical Healthcare Infrastructure: Leveraging Innovation and Public-Private Partnerships for Resilient Health Systems,” co-authored with Thomas Cellucci. He talks with Host Llewellyn King and Co-host Adam Clayton Powell III.