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House committee hears broad support for bill encouraging media literacy instruction
Summary
Supporters told the House Education Committee HB 508 would help students evaluate online information, reduce harm from misinformation and support mental health; proponents urged the bill as a nonbinding policy statement and staff said existing standards already address many of the bill’s aims.
Representative Kelly Kortum, sponsor of House Bill 508, told the House Education Committee the bill is a policy statement encouraging schools to teach media literacy, saying the Internet’s evolution makes it harder for students to distinguish reliable information.
The measure would direct attention and resources to media- and information-literacy skills—such as identifying safe and unsafe websites, tracing ownership and source, and evaluating bias—without prescribing instructional minutes or a specific statewide curriculum. Kortum said she provided an amendment with definitions for terms such as misinformation, disinformation, propaganda and indoctrination and described…
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