Mental Illness and Law Enforcement Guest: Michael Woody, President of CIT International, Retired Akron Police Lieutenant When police fatally shoot someone in the United States, there’s a one-in-four chance the person is mentally ill. Over the last three decades, a shift in how mental health is treated in America has filled jails, emergency rooms and homeless shelters with people suffering from mental illness. And police are the de facto first responders. But without specialized training, the standard procedures officers learn at police academy can backfire with someone who has a mental illness. The end is too often tragic.  Law enforcement agencies are increasingly turning to a training program developed by police in Memphis a few decades ago and lauded by the White House as an ideal model for getting officers up-to-speed on mental illness. It’s called Crisis Intervention Team. Designing Spaces for People with Autism Guest: Sherry Ahrentzen, PhD, Professor of Construction Management at the University of Florida, Co-Author of “At Home with Autism”; Kim Steele, Director of Urban and Health Initiatives for The Elemental Group, Co-Author of “At Home with Autism” For a person with autism, a squeaky ceiling fan, splashing faucet or cluttered room can be more than just annoying – it can be debilitating. Parents go to great lengths to minimize those kinds of stimuli that can be so problematic for an autistic child.  A new book called “At Home with Autism” offers design tips, but it’s also intended as a guide for building homes and communities where people with autism can thrive beyond the relative safety of a parent’s home.  Star Wars and Eastern Religions Guest: Julien Fielding, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, Author of “Discovering World Religions at 24 Frames Per Second” Star Wars is almost a religion unto itself. Devotees quote Yoda and Obi Wan and Darth Vader like scripture, fraught with symbolic meaning. Ever since Luke, Leia and their droids first arrived on screens in 1977, religious scholars have noted its Christian parallels: Jedi knights as crusaders, the red-faced Sith Lord Darth Mal as Satan, the Force as the power of God. So the Christian themes are much-heralded, but Star Wars has strains of Judaism and Buddhism and Daoism, too. In fact, the franchise is so fertile with religious themes that University of Nebraska at Omaha adjunct professor Julien Fielding now uses it as the platform for an upper-level course on religious studies.  What’s Being Taught in Islamic Schools? Guest: Charles Glenn, PhD, Professor of Educational Leadership at Boston University This is the first day of Ramadan – the holy month when Muslims fast from food and drink from sun up to sundown. Only about 1 percent of the US population is Muslim, so imagine the challenge of going an entire month in the heat of summer without eating or drinking during the day while your colleagues and classmates snack and sip away in front of you.  Ramadan is probably a little easier for Muslim kids enrolled in the 230 or so Islamic high schools in the US where fasting this month is the rule, not the exception. My next guest has spent years interviewing students, teachers and parents involved in Islamic schools to better understand what’s being taught there. Public polls show Americans, in general, are very skeptical of the how committed Muslims living in the US are to being American. Many worry Islamic schools teach extreme ideology.  Parent Previews Guest: Rob Gustafson, Film Reviewer at ParentPreviews.com  A tragic romance called “Me Before You” opened in theaters over the weekend and was apparently the go-to choice for anyone not interested in seeing superheroes or animation. “Me Before You” is about a young man, paralyzed by a spinal cord injury, falling in love with his new caregiver – but he’s already started the ball rolling to commit suicide. The film is based on a successful novel. It’s drawn considerable opposition from the disability rights community unhappy with how it portrays disability a problem best solved by death.  Better Bacteria Testing Guest: William Pitt, PhD, BYU Chemical Engineering Professor; Mike Alder, Director of the Technology Transfer Office at BYU The rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is a global health crisis, fueled partly by the inability to quickly identify exactly what strain of bacteria infects a person. Current testing takes up to three days, during which time doctors basically have to guess which antibiotic to prescribe. If they guess wrong and the infection is particularly aggressive, a patient could be dead before the bacteria test results are in.