One Book Community Read: Heartland: Themes & Research

This documentary profiles the current and future generations of farmers and ranchers, and explores the present state of agriculture.

A searing expose into the alarming humanitarian crisis in America's own backyard: over half a million people experiencing homelessness. Explores stereotypes about this controversial issue and digs into the root causes of the problem, its intersection with rising inequality, racial and class disparities, untreated mental illness as well as possible future actions, featuring contributions from leading politicians, experts, and unhoused advocates.

Poverty in America is probably not what you think. Emmy Award-winning producer Linda Midgett shows us in this groundbreaking documentary a new face of poverty in America. About 50 million people in the United States live below the poverty line and one in four American children lives in poverty.

From the Founding Farmers to the modern Farm Bill, what has 200 years of progress brought to the table? More food at lower prices for sure, but also food fights over the environment, hunger, nutrition, and waste. Watch a history of food and agriculture in America.

3 million people in the U.S. live below the poverty line, twice as many as it was fifty years ago. 1.5 million children are homeless, three times more than during the Great Depression. In the historically poor Appalachian mining region, people rely on food stamps for food. In Los Angeles, the number of homeless people has increased dramatically. As a sign of hope, in the poorest neighborhoods, community organizations offer small wooden huts to those who no longer have a roof.

The experience of child poverty against the backdrop of the pandemic and increasing racial tensions. Set in Ohio, follow children and their families navigating issues of poverty, homelessness, race and new challenges due to COVID-19.

Frontline and ProPublica report on the economic and social forces shaping Dayton, Ohio, a once-booming city where nearly 35 percent now live in poverty. This program tells intimate stories of one Rust Belt city's struggle to recover in the post-recession economy.

In the last decade, almost 10% of community hospitals have shut down in rural towns across the country. The closures have led to dwindling populations and limited access to healthcare.

Barbara Kopple’s Academy Award–winning documents a grueling coal miners’ strike in a small Kentucky town. With unprecedented access, Kopple and her crew captured the miners’ sometimes violent struggles with strikebreakers, local police, and company thugs during a thirteen-month struggle between a community fighting to survive and a corporation dedicated to the bottom line.

Explores the disturbing realities that many people in low-wage jobs face every day—such as having to decide whether to pay the rent, buy groceries, or see a doctor and draws connections between America’s immigration challenges and the swelling numbers of working poor.