How to educate young people about information, news literacy

Nearly half of the college students in a 2018 study said they weren’t sure how to tell the difference between real and fake news on social media platforms. Beyond that, more than 30 percent of respondents say that the possibility of misinformation decreases their trust in all media.

We spoke with a researcher and a news literacy specialist about the information challenges young people — and others — face. We also explored the future of information and news literacy and the education tools you can employ in your day-to-day life.

Guests:

• Barbara Fister is scholar-in-residence at Project Information Literacy, a nonprofit research institute that conducts scholarly studies about students and how they find, evaluate and select information. She is also a professor emerita at Gustavus Adolphus College.

• Suzannah Gonzales is a former journalist and the associate director of education for the News Literacy Project. NLP is a national education nonprofit offering nonpartisan programs that teach students how to know what to believe in the digital age.

  To listen to the full conversation you can use the audio player above.

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