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* HB234 synopsis…
Beginning with the 2022-2023 school year, requires every public high school to include in its curriculum a unit of instruction on media literacy; sets forth what topics the unit of instruction shall include. Provides that the State Board of Education shall determine how to prepare and make available instructional resources and professional learning opportunities for educators that may be used for the development of the unit of instruction.
Capitol News Illinois…
But Sen. Terri Bryant, R-Murphysboro, questioned how objective schools could be in teaching students how to evaluate news stories by separating factual news from “fake news.”
“What’s fake news and what is not fake news,” she asked.
Villa replied that teachers are trained in how to instruct students in media usage and that the difference between fake news and real news is the same as the difference between fiction and nonfiction.
“So the teachers themselves would be deciding what’s fake news, by their own opinion,” Bryant asked.
She asked hypothetically what would happen if a district decided that CNN anchor Anderson Cooper was a liar. “They could basically say that anything Anderson Cooper says is fake news,” Bryant said.
Villa, however, said the instruction would just be designed to teach students how to verify information in a news story in order to evaluate for themselves what is accurate and what is not.
Sigh.
* Sun-Times editorial…
The Illinois Legislature, in a historic and symbolically powerful gesture, is likely as early as this week to abolish the criminalization of HIV transmission. House Bill 1063 sailed through the House in April, with bipartisan support, and looks certain to be approved by the Senate and signed into law by Gov. J.B. Pritzker.
Illinois then will have joined five other states since 2014 — California, Colorado, Iowa, Michigan and North Carolina — that have put an end to the criminalization of HIV transmission and it will be setting a fine example for 33 other states that still have such laws.
To understand how the laws came to be in the first place — how a public health crisis became a matter for cops and prisons — it helps to recall the fear, even hysteria, that swept the country in the early 1980s as Americans became aware of a mysterious and deadly new disease, AIDS.
People feared they could catch the bug just by touching somebody, and there were no effective medical treatments. Some state laws criminalized biting or spitting by an HIV-positive person, though saliva was not a probable transmission risk.
Adding to the fear was the loathing. Homophobia, more intense then than it is today, made it easier for legislatures to write laws that treated people with HIV — mostly gay men — as criminals rather than victims. No other sexually transmitted or communicable disease, such as tuberculosis, hepatitis or syphilis, could put you in line for jail.
House roll call is here. No surprises.
* Center Square…
As lawmakers continue to hash out budget details for how to spend Illinois taxpayers’ money, one tax credit in the governor’s crosshairs has private school advocates fighting to keep it alive.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker said this week his proposal to limit the Invest In Kids tax credit program is less expensive for the state’s taxpayers.
“I don’t want scholarships to go away at all,” Pritzker said Monday. “What we’re trying to do, two things, one is we introduced a budget that is balanced in a pandemic, and one of the changes that we proposed making is to rely on federal tax benefits and tax deductions rather than state tax credits.”
The governor’s proposal would drop the Invest In Kids tax credit from 70% to 40% with an impact of $14 million. That’s one of nine different tax credit programs the governor is looking to either limit or end for a total impact of $932 million.
posted by Rich Miller
Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 11:24 am
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Previous Post: It Is Time to Repeal PNA
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Sigh…you wouldn’t want that bill to pass if the Republicans ran State government. Just sayin.
Comment by Reading Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 11:36 am
“What’s fake news and what is not fake news,” she asked.
Perhaps Bryant needs some education on this topic. When I went to high school in IL in the 2000s, we learned about primary, secondary, and tertiary sources. We learned about different types of evidence, trying to corroborate information, etc.
It’s almost as if there are objective tools we can use to determine fact from fiction, and to determine if something is fairly trustworthy or not very trustworthy.
It’s really, really sad to hear Bryant’s comments. They’re pathetic and reveal her ignorance.
Comment by Techie Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 11:45 am
===She asked hypothetically what would happen if a district decided that CNN anchor Anderson Cooper was a liar. “They could basically say that anything Anderson Cooper says is fake news,” Bryant said.===
Nobody lies all the time. Nobody tells the truth all the time. Not every news story has it’s facts straight. There are many stories that quote sources that have the facts wrong. How you determine what is “fake news” and what is legit is by using reason and critical thinking, asking questions, demanding answers. It really isn’t that hard if your main objective is knowing the truth regardless of bias.
Comment by Ducky LaMoore Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 11:49 am
Not surprised at Team Pritzker cutting back the Invest in Kids Program.
Instead of recognizing the opportunity this programs give to parents who want a good education for their children, he purposely gets on board to destroy a program that has worked.
It was fine for Pritzker to get an education in private schools, but let’s not let that happen for working class or did advanced children.
Comment by Back to the Future Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 12:00 pm
Terri Bryant obviously needs to take that media literacy class.
She isn’t aware of the concepts involved, which is a good sign she also doesn’t understand the concepts involved.
Comment by TheInvisibleMan Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 12:00 pm
I’d just ask one question of Bryant.
Can Bryant explain the difference between news and commentary… and where does prime time cable news fit in these categories?
Thanks.
Comment by Oswego Willy Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 12:02 pm
===Not surprised at Team Pritzker cutting back the Invest in Kids Program.===
You should only be surprised because he campaigned on killing it entirely.
Comment by Rich Miller Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 12:27 pm
I was a journalism major and I sometimes think that my old profs (who were the grizzled old city desk editor types) are spinning like tops in their graves for what is passing as journalism. Forget fact-checking. Blatant lies and half-truths and rumors are presented as facts now. The scary thing is that many people want to fill their narratives so bad, they are cool with it. I think it would be great if kids were taught how to discern, but who would teach the teachers and the kids’ parents how? Ugh!
Comment by levivotedforjudy Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 12:53 pm
Good point on his campaign promises.
Investing in our children’s education should be a top priority. The cost of this program is tiny compared to the long term benefit to the state in helping our children succeed in an increasing competitive and difficult world.
We need a sense of fairness and empathy in state government. This is reckless and without justification IMHO.
Comment by Back to the Future Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 12:54 pm
It all depends on the meaning of words…words have meaning…only as long as they have a common meaning…When they lose that common meaning…We are lost…like Towering Babel ready to fall.
Comment by Dotnonymous Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 1:29 pm
Invest in Kids is about the only thing Rauner accomplished in 4 years. Of course Pritzker should have campaigned on eliminating it. Like a lot of the other campaign promises now blowing in the wind, just let this one go. It’s never received the max donations. Eliminating it saves a pittance and the program actually helps some kids. It sounds like part of the Governor’s own party want to see it stay now because it helps their constituents. He got to beat Rauner over the head with it, and make the teachers unions happy by talking tough. Gor crying out loud, the thing sunsets after 12/31/22. Why fight with part of the constituency over this tiny program, that will be gone in a year anyway, when there are a lot of other tax changes that would save real money? Just doesn’t make any sense to me. Then again, given the Governor’s recent legislative track record, maybe him back its repeal is just the shot in the arm the program needs.
Comment by NoMoreMC Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 1:37 pm
Yeah, let’s keep that unconstitutional Invest in Kids. Give me a break.
Comment by Collinsville Kevin Wednesday, May 19, 21 @ 2:40 pm