Today, Rebecca Wolfe encourages more experimentation in education to promote innovation and student success; Elizabeth Economy speaks with an expert on political and social life in China about US-China relations in 2026; and Michael McFaul laments the expiration today of the New START Treaty, between the US and Russia, limiting the number of nuclear weapons each nation can deploy.
Reforming K–12 Education
Transformative ideas for learning are often seen as descending from the top or coming from outside, writes Rebecca E. Wolfe at Defining Ideas. Wolfe argues this view overlooks bottom-up changes, generated in schools, that also hold great promise. These organic reforms often fail to take hold or to blossom, she writes, because of institutional attitudes and policies that include bureaucracy, inhibited communication and networking, and simple fatigue. In a new report from the Hoover Institution’s Education Futures Council, Wolfe writes that school districts can do much more to help good ideas spread: by embracing a “fail-forward” attitude, by hiring teachers with experimental minds, and by reframing education as discovery and not just an exercise in “compliance and delivery.” Read more here.
Confronting and Competing with China
In a new episode of China Considered, Senior Fellow Elizabeth Economy and Lingling Wei, chief China correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, sit down for a wide-ranging conversation on China’s purges and Wei’s personal story. Economy and Wei also look ahead to US-China relations for 2026. They begin with the recent ouster of General Zhang Youxia from China's Central Military Commission and what it reveals about Xi Jinping's consolidation of power ahead of the 2026 Party Congress. Wei then shares how she was inspired by her mother to take up journalism in China, how she was expelled by Beijing in 2020, and how she continues reporting on China. The two then conclude with a discussion on the US and China. The two agree on the need to understand everyday Chinese struggles, not just Xi's policies, even as Beijing turns the country into a "black box" for foreign reporters. Read more here.
Arms Control
“Today marks the end of the New START Treaty—the last major bilateral nuclear arms control agreement between the United States and Russia,” writes Senior Fellow Michael McFaul at his Substack. “With limitations on the buildup of strategic nuclear arsenal set to expire today, the world, including the United States, will become inherently more dangerous tomorrow,” he argues. “There will no longer be any limits on how many nuclear weapons both countries can deploy.” McFaul reflects on his participation during the Obama administration, as US ambassador to Russia, in negotiations to establish the treaty—alongside his Hoover Institution colleague Research Fellow Rose Gottemoeller, who served as lead negotiator for the US. Examining the prospects for a new nuclear deal, McFaul says, “Negotiating a follow-up agreement to New START seemed like low-hanging fruit. But instead of sending arms control experts to Moscow, Trump keeps sending a New York real estate mogul.” Read more here.
USA at 250
As America approaches its 250th anniversary, questions about the nation’s intellectual foundations and future direction remain central to civic life. What traditions shaped the American experiment in its first two and a half centuries, and which ideas will continue to guide it in the years ahead? This special panel, presented as a collaboration among Stanford’s College 102 program, the Hoover Institution, and the Stanford Department of History, examines the classical and 18th-century Enlightenment influences that have shaped American political and civic thought, as well as other traditions. Speakers will explore how ideas drawn from antiquity and Western civilization informed the nation’s founding, how the legacy of slavery complicates that inheritance, and how differing interpretations of the past continue to shape debates about America’s future. The Hoover Institution will host this event on Wednesday, February 11, from 6 to 8 p.m. PT. Learn more and register here.
Answering Challenges to Advanced Economies
In an interview with The Stanford Review, Senior Fellow Joshua Rauh addresses “America's most consequential fiscal questions.” Examining the proposed 5% wealth tax on billionaires in California, Rauh argues, “This is a potential major disaster for California. We’re running the risk of experiencing what happened to Detroit after the 1950s and 1960s. We assume that because the weather’s nice, things will be fine. But these systems are far more fragile than people think.” Looking at the US fiscal situation, Rauh says, “I’m very concerned about a US fiscal crisis. We’re spending so much more money than we’re taking in from taxes, and doing it through these welfare programs, while the world’s not getting any safer. We haven’t had to fight an existential war in a very long time. We’re not putting ourselves in a robust position to fight such a war if we’re already running massive deficits during peacetime.” Read more here.
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