Good News About the Future of News Literacy

[Commentary] In a new Brookings paper, James Klurfeld and Howard Schneider provide a detailed view of an innovative Stony Brook University program that teaches students to do more of the critical vetting of information that professional journalism has traditionally provided.

Today’s problem is that the business model which once supported newsroom journalism is disintegrating. Moreover, much of the public recognizes no difference, even in principle, between what (say) The New York Times does and what Daily Kos does.

If professionals are less and less able to vet information, perhaps consumers can do it themselves. Perhaps, in any case, they’ll have to, because no one else will.

Teaching young people how to evaluate information sources, think critically, and check before retweeting makes sense for all kinds of reasons. What news literacy cannot do -- and, of course, does not pretend to do -- is make professional newsrooms and journalists stop disappearing at an alarming rate. And the sad truth is that enlightened amateurism, whether on the part of consumers or producers, is no substitute for dedicated professionalism.