A revived effort to mandate educators teach K-12 online literacy is the goal of Pennsylvania state Sen. Katie Muth, (D-44) who has introduced a Senate Co-Sponsorship Memo for the 2025-2026 legislative session. Muth represents constituents in Chester, Montgomery and Berks counties. Muth explained the bill was previously introduced during the 2023-2024 legislative session as Senate Bill 496, where it was “referred to the senate Education Committee in March, 2023, and was never brought up for consideration, a hearing or a vote.”
“The rise of misinformation, disinformation, and content deliberately disguised as legitimate news undermines public discourse and threatens the foundation of our democracy. This bill helps [students] learn how to identify credible sources and think critically about what they read and share,” said Bucks County state Sen. Steve Santarsiero (D-10), who is co-sponsoring the proposed legislation, but is not a co-prime sponsor of the bill.
In 2023, Gov. Phil Murphy signed legislation to enact the country’s first state government mandate media literacy to K-12 students, Poltitico.com reported.
“The intentional spreading of disinformation and inaccurate, falsified reports has grown significantly in our country, and beyond, and it is imperative that our students learn how to think critically and how to discern what is factual information and what is biased, misleading and/or false,” Muth said. “This bill would provide Pennsylvania students with the necessary critical thinking skills and knowledge to evaluate the accuracy of news stories for themselves.”
Muth explained the bill was previously introduced during the 2023-2024 legislative session as Senate Bill 496. It was “referred to the senate Education Committee in March, 2023, and was never brought up for consideration, a hearing or a vote.”
“This legislation is intended to help students discern whether sources are credible as they are bombarded with information from various social media platforms and other media outlets, many of which are for-profit entities or entities backed by groups that focus on providing certain information or messaging,” said Muth.
While costs to implement the media literacy mandate could vary from school district to district – depending on their staffing and existing online resources – Muth said in many cases the new curriculum would likely align with existing civics programs already being taught; as well as online database services such as ProQuest, Encyclopedia Britannia, TeachingBooks, among others. While some initial training costs for school district staff would be needed, ongoing training or professional development could be part of current funding for annual school curriculum programming, according to Muth.
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“The bill requires the [state] Department of Education to provide age appropriate resources and curriculum guidance for each grade, so districts wouldn’t need to create new programs from scratch,” Santarsiero said.
PDE already has a media resources webpage for students and teachers; however, “the current resources offered by PDE do not include access to evidence-based, peer-reviewed information that is available through online resource databases,” said Muth.
The legislation’s goal – should it clear hurdles to become state law – would result in a K-12 curriculum implementation which would help students develop critical thinking skills; understand how media influences shape culture and society, identify targeted marketing strategies and persuasion technique methods; spot bias and misinformation and learn how to identify when narrative elements are being left out.
She said developing these skills early would help students figure out when media information is credible, unbiased and based on facts – and when it is not.
