“Spotlight on Lifelong Learning” with Laura Loth, is a weekly look at some of the exciting public conversations upcoming around Memphis. Laura Loth is a professor at Rhodes College.

The August Primary Election is coming up this week and the Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate are in full attack mode. 

Ads are blanketing TV and social media and high-profile surrogates have been flooding the state to help out Manny Sethi and Bill Hagerty. WPLN’s Sergio Martínez-Beltrán has been on the campaign trail lately and talks about what he's seen from the candidates.  

Election officials in Tennessee have now changed their position on who they deem eligible to vote absentee.

The state made its revelation Thursday at a state Supreme Court hearing, after previously resisting expanded mail-in voting.

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the absentee voting system in Shelby County.  Following a lawsuit, voters can now select a mail-in ballot if they want to avoid polling sites to protect their health. Linda Phillips, the Shelby County Election Commission's administrator, says as a result her team is processing more mail-in ballots than ever. 

Phillips joins this week’s WKNO-TV Behind the Headlines with host Eric Barnes and Daily Memphian reporter Bill Dries. They talk about the other ways the Election Commission has adapted the voting system during the pandemic. Phillips says voters can expect new safety protocols at polling sites including disposable pens, lots of hand sanitizer and protective plexiglass barriers to keep poll workers and voters separated.  

Wrapping up, the guests compare previous years to the upcoming general and presidential elections.

Shelby County residents are masking up in greater numbers, at least while shopping in grocery and retail stores, according to a new University of Memphis observational study. But, the findings also show that mask usage is still lagging in some of the city’s busiest social spots.