The News Literacy Project becomes independent on May 1

Updates


The News Literacy Project is stepping out on its own for the first time on May 1. The three-year-old project has been operating for nearly 2½ years under the fiscal sponsorship of the Poynter Institute for Media Studies.

Though NLP has been responsible for its own fundraising and program operations, Poynter handled the project’s finances, payroll and benefits as its designated 501(c)(3) sponsor. The Tides Center, a nonprofit organization based in San Francisco, was NLP’s fiscal agent during its initial year.

The Internal Revenue Service approved NLP as an independent nonprofit on March 11. NLP completed its transition with Poynter this in April.

“This is an important milestone in extending the program to more students and teachers and also to more parts of the country,” said NLP board chairman John S. Carroll.

“We’re grateful to the Poynter Institute the invaluable help it’s provided during NLP’s formative years.”

Becoming independent shifts legal and fiscal responsibility to the News Literacy Project’s board, whose members include national leaders in the fields of journalism, education and public relations.

During the process of applying to the IRS and taking other steps necessary to operate independently, NLP has been represented on a pro bono basis by the Washington office of the law firm of Dickstein Shapiro LLP. Attorneys Peter Kadzik, Jonathan Levi and Alicia O’Brien have been especially helpful in guiding the project through this process.

NLP is working with 30 teachers in 12 middle schools and high schools in New York City, Chicago and Bethesda, Maryland, to reach more than 1,700 students this school year. It plans to expand in each region in the 2011-12 school year.

NLP brings seasoned journalists into the schools to give students the tools to discern credible information from rumor, opinion, misinformation and propaganda.

More Updates

For Education Week, educators share how they teach students to question health influencers

An opinion piece in EducationWeek by two educators from New York featured the News Literacy Project’s District Fellowship program. The commentary described how the program supported their efforts to teach students to critically evaluate health and wellness claims on social media. “By the end, our teens had developed habits of healthy skepticism when scrolling their…

NLP in the News

In CNN piece, NLP urges care and transparency as journalism embraces AI

Peter Adams, the News Literacy Project’s Senior Vice President of Research and Design, was featured in a CNN article examining the use of artificial intelligence to generate content in newsrooms and the challenges it raises around verification and transparency. “It is precisely because AI is prone to errors that newsrooms must maintain the ‘fundamental standards…

NLP in the News

Insider Spotlight: Genna Sarnak

Welcome to the Insider Spotlight section, where we feature real questions from our team and answers from educators who are making a difference teaching news literacy. This month, our featured educator is Genna Sarnak from Northfield, Massachusetts, where she teaches digital media literacy to middle school students.

Updates