Is a liberal arts degree worth it?

Is a liberal arts degree worth it?

Student debt in the U.S. has risen dramatically in the last few decades, while recent college graduates are having a harder time finding work. For the last five years, the unemployment rate of college graduates is above the national average and students graduate with an average of $40,000 dollars of debt. Meanwhile, students with degrees in technology or finance might find they are facing a work landscape transformed by artificial intelligence. But what about a liberal arts degree? We sit down with students, faculty and administrators at Linfield University to ask whether a liberal arts degree is still worth it.

REBROADCAST: Oregon grandparents share lived experiences to promote vaccinations for preventable illnesses

Grandparents for Vaccines is a nationwide nonprofit that aims to educate the current generation of parents about vaccine-preventable diseases. Launched in September 2025, the group has produced videos of grandparents describing what it was like to endure or witness their friends, classmates and relatives battle illnesses such as polio, measles and pertussis before vaccines for them existed. The group’s launch comes amid rising vaccine skepticism fueled by misinformation about the safety and efficacy of vaccines. A recent poll by the Kaiser Family Foundation and The Washington Post showed that 1 in 6 parents in the US have delayed or skipped vaccines for their children. Teri Mills is a founding member of Grandparents for Vaccines and a retired public health nurse who was named "Oregon Nurse of the Year" in 2019 by the Oregon Nurse Foundation. We listen back to a conversation we first aired on Nov. 19, 2025 with Mills and Sheri Schouten, a retired public health nurse and former Oregon state lawmaker, to hear their work with Grandparents for Vaccines.

Unethical AI use in legal filings on the rise in Oregon and the US, along with penalties

Two Oregon lawyers were recently fined $110,000 for including fictitious cases in filings that were AI “hallucinations.” This is not the first such case in Oregon, and General Counsel of the Oregon State Bar Ankur Doshi says it’s unlikely to be the last. There are hundreds of cases across the U.S. where the use of AI has resulted in incorrectly cited cases, fabricated quotes, cases that don’t exist, or all three. Doshi says using AI this way is antithetical to the sworn duties and responsibilities of the profession. Courts are increasingly imposing higher fines for these violations and state bar associations are also meting out discipline, which can range from admonitions to disbarment. Doshi joins us to share more about the regulations and guidance in place for using AI in legal proceedings.

Eugene launches peer navigation program one year after CAHOOTS shutdown

It’s been just over a year since the crisis intervention program CAHOOTS stopped providing services [https://www.opb.org/article/2025/06/04/eugene-after-cahoots-the-end-of-the-crisis-response-program-and-the-efforts-to-bring-it-back/] in Eugene after the city decided to end its contract with the organization. The mobile team had operated in the city since 1989. Lane County launched its own crisis response team [https://www.opb.org/article/2024/08/15/lane-county-behavioral-health-mobile-crisis-response-vans/] in 2024, and now, the city is partnering with Ideal Option [https://www.idealoption.com/] to send peer navigators [https://www.klcc.org/housing-homelessness/2026-04-07/eugene-announces-new-peer-navigation-program-following-loss-of-cahoots] on non-emergency calls. Navigators will respond to welfare checks and connect community members to housing, behavioral health and other services.   Eugene-Springfield Fire Chief Mike Caven joins us to talk about the new program and the state of emergency response services in Eugene.

OSU study shows faster water flows from warming winters, with impacts on water supply in Pacific Northwest

This past winter tied Oregon’s record for the warmest winter ever recorded. The warmer temperatures have led to record-low snowpack levels not only in Oregon but across many other western states [https://www.drought.gov/drought-status-updates/snow-drought-current-conditions-and-impacts-west-2026-04-09]. Climate change will likely make our winters not only warmer but also rainier, as more of the winter precipitation falls as rain instead of snow.    That rain and melting snow are also expected to move faster through our landscape into rivers and streams in the Pacific Northwest through the coming decades, according to a new study [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-026-46539-1] led by scientists at Oregon State University. Scientists developed a model that estimates current and future water transit times based on precipitation events in a tributary of the Yakima River. Faster water flows through the landscape could be a variable that water managers may need to consider when planning for summer months when water demand is greatest.    Zach Butler is a postdoctoral researcher at OSU and the lead author of the study. He joins us for more details.