Office Hours Podcast: What We Can Learn From College Professors

College professors are being blamed for everything from grooming their students to installing a woke agenda in their burgeoning minds. It's directly from the right-wing playbook to demonize some of the most educated people in your nation because they are so often the ones that can see right through the demagoguery. 

 

Issac Brickman to the rescue. On his new podcast, Office Hours, Brickman talks to a professor about a topic that is relevant to you. Each professor will have a different perspective on the topic.

"The goal is twofold," says Brickman. "First, I want to make academia more accessible and applicable to everyone, including non-academic audiences. I also want to help dissolve the boundaries between disciplines by taking a holistic approach to learning."

The creator/host, Isaac Brickman, is a recent Honors Graduate with a BA in Political Science from the University of Massachusetts / Amherst. 

 He is also a prospective Law Student with interest in Online Social Platforms, and he is a published researcher. Isaac was the Head Graphics Designer for the Massachusetts Daily Collegian, and leads a team of four interns in data entry for political candidates on a voter-tech platform called WeVote. He enjoys reading, hiking, and working out.

The show began in late July 2025, with episodes averaging about 50 minutes in length.  Ethan Zuckerman, a professor at UMass Amherst, was the inaugural guest on the show. 

"Our first topic is social media, and I am excited to have Ethan Zuckerman on the show to talk about it," says Isaac. 

Ethan Zuckerman is an associate Communications, Computer Science, and Public Policy professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He was an affiliate of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard, former director of the Center for Civic Media at MIT, a TED talker, author, and regretful inventor of the pop-up ad. His crowning achievement, however, was being Brickman's thesis advisor. 

Any discussion of social media today is fraught with warnings, dissections of what went wrong, dire predictions, and its effect on the minds of its users. 

Isaac Brickman's discussions with university professors are academic in nature, but not necessarily boring or pedantic. For those who want to investigate modern issues and go beyond the clickbait headlines of websites, social media, and state media masquerading as news networks, this show is for you. 

Brickman's nasal voice notwithstanding, his interviewing style is straightforward and incisive.  

 My favorite episode was with Dr. Kristina Steiner, who is a lifespan developmental psychologist who teaches at Denison University. 

She runs a research program that focuses on autobiographical memory and is especially interested in investigating the directive function of personal and shared memories across age groups and cultures, as well as the relationships between life story narratives and various outcomes, such as well-being. This is fascinating stuff.

Other episodes of note include gender and sexuality, and human-animal relations, all in the context of Islam and particularly Turkey, and postsocialism, Eastern Europe, far-right politics, and the invasion of Ukraine.

Like most independent podcasts, Office Hours is not for everyone. While the show features academics, its topics are theoretical or abstract. Social media, gender and sexuality, autocratic politics, and invasions have on-the-ground consequences. I think Isaac Brickman has secured a significant accomplishment, which is countering the far-right's tar and feathering of the intellectual class.