‘A Look at the Issues’: the Blavatnik School students’ podcast on current public policy matters

When we started our Master of Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government and met all the students and staff, we could not help but feel overwhelmed by the diversity, the passion, the compassion and the vision that everyone had. What every single individual who studies and works here has in common is a vision for change. We all want to make the world “better led, better served and better governed” through our hard work, ideas and through initiatives we deeply
believe in.

The MPP class of 2019 – 124 students from 50 countries and territories – boasts a rich tapestry of policy experience ranging from street-level bureaucrats, to international organisations policy implementers, as well as entrepreneurs, activists, lobbyists and politicians. The knowledge and experience that everyone brings helps widen and challenge our own views, paving the way for ideas and solutions to global policy challenges. 

As students, we often wonder why these discussions are limited to the classroom. We strongly feel that we have something valuable to share and that our perspectives and experiences can help inform and empower others. We also want to send a message to current global leaders to have faith in the youth: we are not just concerned about surging avocado prices, we are worried about our future, and we are committed to working hard to make a difference in public policy and government around the world.

It’s for this reason – to share our experiences and to open the conversation – that we decided to create the first ever Blavatnik School student policy podcast, called “A Look at the Issues”.

“A Look at the Issues” analyses a current policy issue by bringing new perspectives that are not often considered in that context. This student-led policy podcast is an opportunity for us MPP students to share our experiences, concerns and views through a series of discussions between us or with specific policy experts. 

In 30 minutes or less, each episode explores a policy challenge from a new point
of view, perhaps  unknown to the listener, but relevant to the policymaking process. Our hope is that at the end of each episode our listeners will ask themselves: “How come I have never
thought of that?” or “Hmm, I never saw it that way."

The first season of our podcast will touch upon a variety of issues ranging from the implications of Brexit, to education policy and prison reform, and ‘policy graveyards’, i.e. those policies that never get enough clout to be implemented.

The first episode of “A Look at the Issues” is about the future of the EU-UK relationship post Brexit and it’s available now on all major podcast platforms including Apple, Google and Spotify. We aim to release a new episode every two weeks on Fridays.