Continuing Studies: Higher Ed Podcasting

Build the studio, and they’ll come… right? Not necessarily. A successful podcast studio starts with solving a real need and giving people the support to actually use the space.

In this episode of Continuing Studies, Neil and Jen talk with Emily Sikora from Penn State about how she built the Podcast Lounge by starting with the user experience, not the technology. Emily shares how simple onboarding, hands-on support, and ...

How does podcasting fit into MIT’s goal of reaching one billion learners?

In this episode of Continuing Studies, Neil and Jen talk with Mary Ellen Wiltrout from MIT about MIT Learn, open learning, and how podcasts can make world-class expertise feel more accessible and human. Mary Ellen shares how MIT is experimenting with podcasts, short videos, and other formats to reach learners beyond traditional courses, and why audio can...

How do you build a podcasting culture in higher ed? Don’t start with the equipment.

In this episode of Continuing Studies, Neil records live from Helix at the University of Leeds with Abigail Harrison Moore, Krissie Glover, and Kerr Hunter for the final conversation in our three-part series on research podcasting. After exploring participatory research with Abigail and production support with Krissie, in this episode they shar...

Can podcasting make teaching more human, more connected, and more effective?

In the second live episode from Higher Ed PodCon, Neil and Jen sit down with Rudy Salo, a lawyer, law professor, public transportation geek, and co-host of Good Is in the Details. Rudy explains how a philosophy podcast about everyday life, dialogue, and critical thinking found its way into the syllabus and how it's helping students see the person behind the...

How do great hosts create conversations that feel purposeful, natural, and worth staying with?

In this episode of Continuing Studies, Neil and Jen sit down with Sophie White from EDUCAUSE live at Higher Ed PodCon to talk about the art of hosting. Drawing from her work on EDUCAUSE Shop Talk, Sophie shares how purpose can shape everything from guest selection to audience focus, and how hosts can create the conditions for more thoughtf...

How do you turn a research idea into a podcast that is clear, credible, and actually doable?

In part two of our three-part series on how collaborative research podcasts get made, Neil and Jen talk with Krissie Brighty-Glover from Research Podcasts about the process they use to bring academic audio to life. Part one explored a real research podcast from the academic’s perspective; this episode looks at the production side, from...

How can academics make their ideas easier to find, more engaging, and harder to misrepresent?

In this episode of Continuing Studies, Neil and Jen dig into the podcast, Archaeology Books for Fun with hosts Tristan Harrenstein and Barbara Clark. Barbara and Tristan excavate the ways they've used their podcast to reach an audience segment they were missing in their other public education programs, using a book club format, non-academic...

After 300+ interviews with Stanford experts, Russ Altman knows how to turn complex ideas into conversations people actually want to follow.

In this episode of Continuing Studies, Neil and Jen talk with Russ, host of The Future of Everything, about the craft behind engaging expert interviews. Russ shares how he keeps highly technical conversations clear and fun, why he sees himself as the “jargon police,” and how curiosit...

How can podcasting become more than a way to share research—and actually become part of the research itself?

In this episode of Continuing Studies, Neil and Jen talk with Abigail Harrison Moore from the University of Leeds about Whose Power, a podcast project created with the Preservative Party, a group of young curators at Leeds City Museum. Abigail shares how the project uses podcasting as a participatory research space&mdas...

How can a podcast use academic research to help us make sense of today’s news?

Neil and Jen talk with Gemma Ware, head of audio at The Conversation UK and host/co-producer of The Conversation Weekly, about how the show brings academic expertise into the news cycle through narrative-produced audio. Gemma shares how The Conversation pairs academic rigour with journalistic flair, helping researchers explain complex ideas in a way...

25 years ago, MIT made a bold choice: share our knowledge with the world, free of charge. Eventually, out of this, Chalk Radio was born as one tool of MIT's OpenCourseWare to deliver that knowledge. 

In this episode, Neil and Jen talk with Brett Paci, producer of the Chalk Radio podcast and Assistant Director of Media Production at MIT OpenCourseWare, about how that mission has evolved over 20+ years. From static course materi...

What are the core skills that make a great podcast host? Before podcasting, there was broadcasting, and there’s still a lot to learn from it.
This week, Neil and Jen go back to school, well, Jen's school that is.They head to BCIT’s broadcasting studios to host Jen’s former instructors, Kathryn Stewart and Kevin Ribble, now co-hosts of Ignite My Voice. Kat and Kevin share what podcast hosts can learn from broadc...

What does it take to turn rigorous scientific research into stories millions of people actually want to listen to?

This week,Neil and Jen sit down with Blythe Terrell, executive editor of Science Vs., to learn how one of the world’s most popular science podcasts blends deep research, narrative storytelling, and a bit of humour to reach millions of listeners. Science Vs. certainly doesn't opt for the path of least resistance, B...

How can podcasting bring diverse voices and forms of academic work to a larger audience?

Neil and Jen sit down with Will Brehm, creator of FreshEd, to talk about how a decade of academic podcasting has evolved from a simple interview show into a broader platform for research, storytelling, and new voices. Will shares how FreshEd grew into a multi-show network, why moving beyond English-language content matters, and what he&r...

Can you actually study podcasting at university—and does it lead to a career?

Neil and Jen talk with Chloe Sackur and Max’ed Aadan, recent graduates of the MA in Podcasting program at City St. George’s, University of London, about what it’s really like to learn podcasting in a university setting. They share how the program blends technical training, storytelling, pitching, and industry placements—an...

What happens when a classroom podcast turns into peer-reviewed scholarship, an AI teaching tool, and its own academic platform?

When Dave Keighron and Dr. Gelareh Farhadian first launched Innovation Fuel, the goal was simple: bring real entrepreneurial stories into the business classroom. Five years later, that idea has grown into something much bigger.

In this episode, Neil and Jen catch up with Dave and Gelareh to talk about how th...

As universities face pressure to evolve, podcasting is emerging as an unexpected catalyst and channel for change.

Carola Boehm first caught Neil’s attention with her EPOD abstract suggesting the ivory tower might be starting to crack — a bold (and maybe slightly controversial) take that kicked off this conversation about how podcasting is reshaping the way knowledge gets created and shared in higher education. So this we...

A thoughtful look at how podcasting is expanding the ways academic work is created and shared.

Jim Ambuske, historian and producer, is back to share his thoughts on where audio is going in the academic world and what it’s going to take to have it recognized as a scholarly medium. Jim gets into his new work on the In Pursuit project, what he’s seeing in the world of digital archives and oral history, and why he believes a...

Start your 2026 inspired and ready for what’s next in higher ed podcasting—straight from the people building it.

What’s ahead for higher ed podcasting in 2026? This episode rounds up predictions from creators and educators around the world, spotlighting the trends shaping the year ahead. Hear why podcasting may gain more academic credibility, how universities could lean on audio as a PR and outreach channel, and wh...