 |
| The News Literacy Project has launched a new resource to help you stay informed and push back against misinformation: RumorGuard.
You can dig deeper into news literacy techniques on RumorGuard and take action for facts. We built RumorGuard to give you the ability to debunk viral falsehoods, but it's also the foundation for our shared future founded on facts. Help us push back against misinformation by signing up and sharing RumorGuard posts with your family and friends. |
|
The "How to Spot Misinformation" sessions at the Senior Center went well. Aside from some tech issues the material was covered and folks should have tools to help them determine how valid the info they find is.
 |
| Misinformation & fact checking resources |
Attention seniors (but anyone who wants to know really!)
"This free short course from MediaWise for Seniors will teach you how to tell what’s true and false on the internet. By looking at examples of political, health, travel and climate misinformation, you will learn techniques for identifying false information and how to seek out trustworthy sources.Christiane Amanpour, Joan Lunden, Lester Holt, Hari Sreenivasan and Dave Jorgenson — MediaWise Ambassadors — will also pop in to share their advice as experienced journalists to help you navigate information on platforms like Google, Facebook and more."
 |
| How to Spot Misinformation Online - Self-directed course, free, start anytime |
Fact Checker | The Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol: A guide to what we now know https://t.co/diNdP9aSym
 |
| Washington Post: Fact Checker - what we now know about Jan 6, 2021 |
"What are you going to believe: Official statements or social media?The Southwest Airlines cancellations over the weekend are a good example of how news travels on two different tracks today.In the part of the United States that relies on traditional media, rumors that the cancellations were the result of a pilot protest over coronavirus vaccine mandates were dismissed because, well, there was no evidence. Official entities, such as the airline, the Federal Aviation Administration and the Southwest pilots union, all issued statements saying the rumors were false."
 |
| Fact check: "The Southwest Airlines mess and rumors of a vaccine walkout" (Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg) |
Community Relations Subcommittee Meeting
 |
| Community Relations Subcommittee Meeting - May 11 |
The 4th and final of the budget hearings for FY 2022 held by the Finance Committee is scheduled for May 4.
| |||||||||
| |||||||||
Older adults — join us & @OlderAdultsTech / @seniorplanet Weds, Mar 31 (1 PM ET) for the 3rd in our series of #NewsLiteracy webinars, this one on fact-checking & digital verification. Gain skills to stick to the facts!
Sign up / spread the word —> https://t.co/KAJmRSxPje
 |
| The News Literacy Project - webinar for Seniors on fact-checking - Mar 31, 1:00 PM |
"GOV. CHARLIE BAKER unveiled a 500-person call center on Friday to help residents 75 and older book appointments to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.
The center is intended to assist those without internet access or those having trouble navigating the current two-step process, which requires using a state website to find vaccine locations near them and then going to websites for those locations to actually book an appointment. The call center, reached by dialing 2-1-1 and selecting the option for help making a vaccine appointment, will handle the booking process for the individual or put them on a call-back list if no appointments are available.
The service will be available from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, with representatives who speak both English and Spanish. Translators for over 100 other languages will also be available upon request."
Daniel Dale met President Trump’s convention speech with a tirade of truth Thursday night — a tour de force of fact-checking that left CNN anchor Anderson Cooper looking slightly stunned.The cable network’s resident fact-checker motored through at least 21 falsehoods and misstatements he had found in Trump’s 70-minute speech, breathlessly debunking them at such a pace that when he finished, Cooper, looking bemused, paused for a moment and then deadpanned, “Oh, that’s it?”So, so much was simply wrong. Claims about the border wall, about drug prices, about unemployment, about his response to the pandemic, about rival Joe Biden’s supposed desire to defund the police (which Biden has said he opposes).Dale is a national treasure, imported last year from the Toronto Star, where he won accolades for bravely tackling the Sisyphean task of fact-checking Trump. My skilled colleagues of The Washington Post Fact-Checker team, who recently published a whole book on the president’s lies, have similarly done their best to hold back the tide of Trumpian falsehoods.
Public data is the raw material with which fact-checkers work every day. Without it, the credibility of rating information as false — without being able to show the reasoning behind the decision — is weakened, no matter how obviously false the content seems. But there is a way to navigate this, even if data is not accessible.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, when conspiracy theories and misinformation related to vaccines, thermometers, and miraculous prevention methods are gaining steam on social media, the fact-checking community has found a simple – and honest – way to say something is probably not 100% true.
Fact-checkers are posting articles with intermediary rating labels such as “unsupported” and “no evidence” to alert audiences to highly dubious content.
In the list of more than 7,800 fact-checks published by the CoronaVirusFacts alliance (http://poy.nu/alliancedatabase), the collaborative project that since January brings together 99 fact-checking organizations from around the world, there are at least 107 articles in which fact-checkers opted to say there was “no evidence” regarding the truthfulness of a certain piece of information rather than flagging it as completely “false”. One-third of these checks were produced in the last two months.
 |
| Unsupported = "fact-checkers opted to say there was 'no evidence'" |
|
| This is an official email from the U.S. Census Bureau. If you have any questions or comments, please contact us (http://www.census.gov/about/contact-us.html). |
"You see, the problem is not that people don't read and listen to the media. The problem is that the media doesn't know themselves."What we do here is not 'traditional media'. I use "we" deliberately. You contribute as much to this site as I do. Your questions, your information, your corrections all help to drive what is shared here. It may be my name on most of the regular posts. It may be Renata's name on the weekly summary of events. But is is YOU behind the scenes feeding us the info and questions.
"If you have a fact-based worldview of today, you might have a chance to understand what's coming next in the future."Thank you! Please continue to read, comment, share and ask question. Together we can become more informed about Franklin or as Hans would say "not ignorant!"
 |
| Hans Rosling - TED bio page |
