SOHAIL: Rest of US should follow NJ’s information literacy mandate
Column: Nohman's Nuances
New Jersey has consistently proven itself to be a top-performing state in education, with 90.5 percent of its population having graduated from high school and 41.5 percent holding a bachelor’s degree or higher. Since 2019, it has led Education Week’s ranking of best Pre-K-12 Program in the nation, with Gov. Phil Murphy (D-N.J.) citing public school funding as a contributor to the state's illustrious statistics.
Recently, Murphy signed a bill to set New Jersey’s education sights even higher. The new law New Jersey S.B. 588 (22R)/NJ A.B. 4169 (22R) will mandate information literacy before high school graduation.
Under this legislation, students will learn to identify misinformation and understand how facts are produced and distributed. The new law also emphasizes ethics in research, teaching students how to identify bias and the factors surrounding an experiment's accuracy rather than just the experiment itself.
This leap marks the first mandated curriculum accommodation in the information age. New Jersey’s K-12 students will now be the first to learn to manage the large array of information at their fingertips. This is quite a stark difference from the public education system more than two decades ago.
Information literacy is a crucial development in the future of children’s education as it teaches children how to spot the difference between a fact and an opinion. Thus, the federal government should pressure each state into its adoption in all primary and secondary schools.
The surprising bi-partisan support for increased information literacy stems from the severe disinformation and online conspiracy theories that plagued recent election cycles.
Donald Trump’s claims of election fraud in 2020 have been a hot topic on the Senate floor and in online chat forums, with more than 40 percent of Americans believing that the 2020 general election was fraudulent. The claims of fraudulence were a key motivator for the Jan. 6, 2022, Capitol riot, and misinformation only helped to diminish the right-wing involvement in the insurrection through claims of left-wing interference.
The problem of misinformation extends past the localized case of Trump.
Misguided distrust in the electoral system only spells chaos for the United States. As Phil Murphy declared in a recent statement, "Our democracy remains under sustained attack through the proliferation of disinformation that is eroding the role of truth in our political and civic discourse."
Political participation is less likely if voters do not believe in the system they are participating in, disparaging voters who are misled by unsourced infographics they find online.
The pandemic is another instance that shows teaching information literacy across the country is imperative. The debate over the effectiveness of masks for three years — coupled with ineffective home remedies — has prevented the infected from taking proper precautions while mitigating the urgency for treatment.
Information literacy classes will teach children how to understand primary and secondary sourcing and urge them not to take social media posts at face value, lessening the doubts surrounding medical claims backed by scientific evidence.
Another basis for implementing information literacy in all classrooms is the role of social media in communication. The lack of gatekeepers for posting on social media means anyone can log onto a website and present an opinion as a fact without needing to provide a source. This leads to the proliferation of clickbait articles, fake news stories and conspiracy theories that influence design to mislead or manipulate. This phenomenon creates harmful myths that indoctrinate children before they can form an opinion.
The most common fears within the Senate are that the new program will label only specific political positions as true or false. To address this claim, the bill’s lead sponsor, Sen. Mike Testa (R-N.J.), stated, "This law isn’t about teaching kids that any specific idea is true or false. Rather, it’s about helping them learn how to research, evaluate and understand the information they are presented for themselves."
The new mandate is non-partisan, which is extremely important when it comes to teaching children about what and what not to believe.
I think the internet has made information more codified, and this information literacy will guarantee New Jersey’s top position for education programs across the country. Other states must follow suit if they would like to foster a new, educated generation of leaders.
Nohman Sohail is a first-year in the School of Arts and Sciences majoring in economics and political science. His column, "Nohman's Nuances," runs on alternate Thursdays.
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