Charles Mayfield

Profile

Independent producer of a national education-news podcast network — self-funded, no outside backers. Builds daily coverage in the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. territories and long-form investigations from public records, federal datasets, and on-record voices. Every production publishes its sources; guest recordings air unaltered; corrections run in the open.

Current Role

Producer & Owner — Education Across the States

October 2026 — Present

• Founded and produces a three-show network: Education Across the States (weekday briefings in the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. territories, 300+ episodes published), NH Education Trends in Southern NH (weekly), and Run the Room (weekly, on building and running a business from the foundations up).
• Directs a 56-jurisdiction monitoring operation: federal agencies (U.S. Department of Education, OCR, OSEP), state education agencies and guidance letters, and school board activity in every state.
• Founded the Education Across the States Correspondents program — semester-length, credit-ready internships for aspiring journalists covering education in their own communities, with all intern work vetted by the producer before broadcast.

Selected Investigations & Productions

One in Five: IEPs and 504 Plans in America

Investigation · October 2026

Analysis of the federal Civil Rights Data Collection (2023–24) and IDEA Section 618 child counts: why 19% of public school students now hold an IEP or a Section 504 plan, tested category by category against the instructional-casualty hypothesis. Published with full charts and sourcing at education-across-the-states.github.io/one-in-five/.

The Plan Nobody Audits — Section 504

National special · October 2026

Section 504-only identification has almost quadrupled in fifteen years under an unchanged legal test. Every on-air claim proof-checked against its source before publication.

Nashua's Facilities Crossroads

Special · October 2026

Coverage of the Harriman facilities master plan and the November school-closure vote, built from the public record, with on-record responses from a former Board of Education member aired verbatim.

Section-by-Section Law Series

Ongoing series

Plain-language, section-by-section walkthroughs of the laws that run schools — the federal IDEA statute (§1400–§1482) and New Hampshire's Ed 1100 rules — written for the teachers who work under them daily.

Public-Records Reporting

• Right-to-know request to the New Hampshire Office of the Advocate for Special Education (October 2026), pursued on the record as producer.
• Standing interview program: public officials, union leadership, publishers, and administrators invited on the record, with responses aired as given.

Production Standards

• Sources published with every episode — documents, datasets, and reporting named for independent verification.
• Nothing invented: no fabricated quotes, figures, or voices. Guest recordings are used exactly as submitted.
• Right of reply for every institution and official covered; embargoes honored.

Areas of Work

Investigative audio production · special education law and practice (IDEA, Section 504, state rules) · federal education data (CRDC, Section 618) · school funding and district budgets · board governance · public-records research · multi-state news monitoring