About this episode

Natalya Murakhver discusses her documentary on the impact of school closures during the pandemic and advocates for children's education and parental rights.

Natalya Murakhver is a documentary filmmaker, writer, and co-founder of Restore Childhood, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit focused on children's education, health, and parental rights advocacy. She directs and produces documentary films through Restore Childhood and as a fellow at Palladium Pictures, and writes for the New York Post and her Substack, Restore Childhood. Born in the Soviet Union and raised in America from age six, Natalya came to filmmaking the way many of the best stories begin — from lived urgency. When New York City schools closed during the pandemic, she founded #KeepNYCSchoolsOpen and filed a lawsuit against Mayor de Blasio to reopen them. That fight became 15 DAYS: The Real Story of America's Pandemic School Closures — a forensic documentary investigation into how and why America's children were locked out of their schools, and what it cost them. Natalya was inspired to make the film in the tradition of Steven Spielberg's Shoah project — the conviction that bearing witness to institutional failure is a moral obligation, not just a creative one. As someone who grew up in the Soviet Union and arrived in America as a child, she recognized early what many did not: the…

People in this episode

Host: Leslie Elliott Boyce

Guest: Natalya Murakhver

Topics covered

• education
• parental rights
• pandemic impact
• documentary filmmaking
• institutional failure

Keywords

• public school corruption
• Covid
• documentary
• children's education
• parental rights
• New York City schools
• pandemic school closures

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Restore Childhood, Palladium Pictures, New York Post

Books & works: 15 DAYS: The Real Story of America's Pandemic School Closures, Shoah

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