Ralph welcomes Allan C. Miller, Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter and the founder and CEO of the non-partisan News Literacy Project to discuss his work teaching young people how to be more discerning and discriminating consumers of news. Plus, Ralph answers your listener questions.
Alan C. Miller is the founder and CEO of the News Literacy Project, a non-partisan education non-profit that provides educators and the public with tools to help them sift through information and determine what is real and what is not. He worked as an investigative reporter for nearly 30 years, winning a Pulitzer Prize for his series on the dangers of the Marine Corps’ Harrier attack jet.
“We encourage people to be skeptical. We encourage them to get a wide variety of sources of information, not just to go to one source or sources they’re likely to believe. And we encourage them to follow a story in the news over time. Because truth often is provisional. And it takes time for it to emerge.”
Alan C. Miller, Founder and CEO of the News Literacy Project
“For the first decade, we were focused on equipping educators to teach their students how to know what news and information to trust. And that’s still our primary mission at this point… But we realized, about a year and a half ago, that the existential challenge to democracy was really a crisis. And certainly the events of the last year, between the pandemic and the election and post- election, underscore that. And so we decided to create a group of resources for the general public as well.”
Alan C. Miller, Founder and CEO of the News Literacy Project
“If people do not go through life relying on facts and truth, they’re endangering themselves. They’re being very gullible to, say, advertisements that offer products that are dangerous to them… Or they support politicians who lie to them and then turn their back on them when they get into office…When you’re separated from reality in your day- to-day interactions, you really are living a highly risky existence. You can’t connect with reality. I mean, when you cross the street, you want to connect with reality, right? To make sure there are no cars coming.”
Ralph Nader
Be a Smart News Consumer