Being a well-informed voter today is much more complex than in past election cycles. Today’s electorate must sort through information, disinformation, and misinformation. This requires fact-checking, questioning, and understanding how algorithms and artificial intelligence can manipulate the truth. These skills are collectively referred to as media literacy, based on the ability to evaluate bias, credibility, and reliability. Ultimately, media literacy requires acknowledging and considering multiple viewpoints—an approach that seems absent in today’s fragmented media landscape. 

Koret believes that K–12 education should play a significant role in developing media literacy skills in the next generation of leaders, citizens, and critical thinkers as a key component of civic education. Young people often struggle to discern fact from fiction, a problem that is exacerbated when more than half of teens get their news from social media, according to the World Press Institute. Recently, California became one of the first states to legislate a requirement for media literacy education in schools. In the aftermath of the 2024 election, this step feels more pressing than ever. 

Koret grantee Common Sense Media is at the forefront of media literacy, helping educators across the country empower their students to become “digital citizens” who make smart choices online and in life. Their popular Digital Citizenship Curriculum was designed and developed with Project Zero at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. It addresses real challenges and digital dilemmas that students face today, equipping young people from Kindergarten through 12th grade with the media literacy skills they will need to participate constructively in a healthy democracy and thrive in an ever-evolving digital world. 

Many families are aware of Common Sense Media, which has been providing high quality educational resources for twenty years– including its widely-used online media rating system. However, people may be less familiar with its robust library of curricula and professional development resources.. Its approach is broad and nonpartisan, with a growing network of 1.3 million educators across the country who have registered to use its free resources. Common Sense materials are used in over 90,000 schools across the country,  83% of which qualify for Title 1 funding.

In 2022, support from the Koret Foundation enabled Common Sense Media to revamp its News & Media Literacy Resource Center and launch the Civics in Digital Life collection to ensure civic education instruction remains relevant in a rapidly changing space. Koret’s continued partnership with the organization has spurred other initiatives, including a new series of AI Literacy Lessons and professional development courses. Additionally, a pilot program in San Francisco provided in-depth training to Bay Area educators. In 2024, Common Sense Media created and disseminated a collection of resources, Essential News and Media Literacy Skills, designed to help teachers prepare their students to think critically about election news and prevent the spread of misinformation; the education outreach team led webinars such as Teaching Civil Discourse and Critical Thinking: Beyond the Headlines; and CSM content writers crafted articles for a weekly newsletter that reaches over 300,000 educators.

Thoughtful consumption and sharing of information fuels our democracy, and it shouldn’t stop when the votes are counted. Civic engagement relies on media literacy—the more savvy and informed we are, the better we can participate meaningfully in our democracy; advocate for what we believe in; and hold our leaders accountable. California’s new requirements meet this new challenge head on, and Koret is proud to support organizations like Common Sense Media who are working to equip our youth with the tools to sustain our democracy for generations to come.