As part of our ongoing COVID Public Info training series, we’re excited to host Julia Raifman and Kristen Nocka to discuss their work and findings from COVID-19 US state policy database (CUSP), a project to obtain and analyze as many state-wide emergency orders and mandates as possible. Here are resources referenced during the discussion, as well as ways to get future updates from COVID Public Info.

Do mask mandates matter? Were governments that shut down schools sooner making the right call? Julia Raifman, assistant professor at Boston University’s School of Public Health, has been organizing the COVID-19 US state policy database (CUSP) to collect and analyze state-wide mandates from across the country to help answer these questions and inform future policy. This Thursday, she shares what she’s learned in a question and answer session with Garance Burke.

Last week, President Donald Trump ordered the Federal Bureau of Investigation to perform a renewed background check into Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh in the wake of Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Pulling from what we’ve seen over the years from other FBI files, here’s some context on what that means.

As part of back-to-school week, we combed through the Central Intelligence Agency archives to find connections between colleges and the Agency, starting with our home turf: Boston.