07/20/2025: The Vatican’s Orphans, A Tutor for Every Student, The Mezcaleros

From 1950 to 1970, the Vatican sent thousands of Italian children to eager American Catholics for adoption. The children entered the United States on orphan visas. The trouble was most of the children were not orphans. They were the children of unwed mothers, many of whom were alive and searching for their children. How the Vatican got into the orphan business is the subject of The Price of Children, a book by author Maria Laurino. Bill Whitaker speaks to Laurino and to American adoptees still struggling with the decades of separation from their birth families. Correspondent Anderson Cooper explores AI in the classroom and learns how the education nonprofit Khan Academy teamed up with the AI company OpenAI to enhance teacher efficiency and deepen student learning. Cooper previews a voice and vision technology from OpenAI, and test-drives a pioneering online tutor named “Khanmigo” from Khan Academy to experience firsthand how the two companies are hoping to help shape the future of education. Mezcal is having its moment. This handcrafted Mexican spirit, made from agave, has seen exponential growth in popularity and production. Correspondent Cecilia Vega travels to Oaxaca and meets the mezcaleros laboring to quench the world’s thirst for mezcal. The deeper you travel into Oaxaca’s countryside, the harder mezcaleros cling to their ancestral methods and the louder they’ll tell you: there’s a price to pay for this mezcal boom. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices