Welcome back! What's been going on?

To start the new school year on track, here's a brief on what the English-speaking world has been up to over the summer.

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US Presidential campaign: a running mate and party conventions

Amidst the Covid crisis (over 6M cases and 185K deaths as of Sept. 1st) and fears of election fraud, with a crumbling US Postal service making mail voting more difficult than ever, the presidential campaign has kept Americans on edge over the summer.

On Aug.11th, right before his party's national convention, Joe Biden, the Democratic candidate, announced he had picked California Senator Kamala Harris as his running mate (ie the Vice-Presidential nominee on the Democratic ticket). A less than surprising move as Biden had already pledged to name a woman and her relatively young age (55) compared to his (77) was definitely a factor to address the concerns of many voters, including Democrats. Harris is now the third woman to serve as a vice presidential candidate for a major political party, and the first Black and South Asian American woman in this position.

Meanwhile, at the Republican convention officially endorsing Donald Trump as presidential nominee, internal divisions within the Ground Old Party (GOP) were as blatant as ever, explains a Guardian column: The Republican convention is proof that traditional Republicans have given up.

Between misinformation, self-aggrandizement and conspiracy theories, notable elements of Donald Trump's acceptance speech were his painting of Joe Biden as a "dangerous socialist", reviving an old party line of opposition to Democrats harking back to the Red Scare, and his downplaying of the covid crisis and his own -- much criticized -- management of it.

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"Anti-corona" movements on the rise

Governments' drastic responses to the global health crisis, from lockdowns to mandatory mask wearing, partial closures and curfews, have inevitably triggered some resistance and protest movements across the world. Observers have noted a striking parallel with a similar movement during the 1918 influenza pandemic -- the Anti-Mask League of San Francisco.

However, a more recent radicalization of these protests has become a source of concern in countries like Germany, where the collusion of individual "anti-mask" libertarians with more organized extreme-right groups escalated to an attack on the Parliament on Aug. 29th.

From anti-science and "Big Pharma" conspiracy theories to alt-right reclaiming of libertarian movements, the political dimension of the Covid crisis is a definitely rising challenge.

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The UK exam results debacle

How to assess students in a fair way in the midst of a pandemic? Did the UK compromise meritocracy with the use of algorithms to come up with end-of-year exam results?

"With students unable to sit for college exams during the pandemic, the government tried guessing how they might do. It did not go well", writes columnist Stephen Castle in the NY Times*.

Under the pressure of students, parents and teachers' unions, as well as a widely unfavourable public opinion, Boris Johnson's government and Education secretary Gavin Williamson had to back down on the controversial use of algorithms to predict students' results (the algorithm had been heavily reliant on socio-economic data furthering inequalities, rather than teacher-based).

Such a "debacle" illustrates the deep flaws of the British educational system, and the need to consider alternatives to traditional grading and systems to avoid social discrimination.

*Register for free on the NYT website to be able to read full-length articles.

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Hong Kong protests: a test for democracy

A movement that began peacefully six months ago has descended into chaos. By the way, why are people protesting and what is the origin of the problem?

Read the NY Times recap about the history of Hong Kong, a former British colony which was handed back to China in 1997 under a policy known as "one country, two systems"; and the tensions that have suddenly escalated this summer following China's introduction of a brutal new piece of legislation.

*Register for free on the NYT website to be able to read full-length articles.

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That's it for now!

Remember to keep following world news on a weekly basis: here is a list of tips on how to do it efficiently, avoiding waste of time, and all the links to major news sources in The Newsroom on this website.

The Guardian Explainers page is a goldmine to answer many of your questions on current events (and it's free!), you may want to bookmark it in your browser.