Media literacy is crucial for healthy societies. Rotary members are teaching people to think critically about what they see and read

 

Media literacy is crucial for healthy societies. Rotary members are teaching people to think critically about what they see and read

By Etelka Lehoczky

The first day at a new school can be disorienting for any teenager. But your first day at Virginia Hall High School is even stranger than most. Your grandfather claims he used to be a spy, your sister accuses some students of locking her in a closet, and everyone says a monster is stalking the hallways.

What is happening? Is any of this true? Instead of rushing off to fight the monster, you read about the weird recent events in the school newspaper. You ask yourself: Do these sources provide multiple pieces of evidence for their claims? Could they possibly be earning money because of what they’re saying? Do their stories cast a negative light on people who disagree with them?

You ask all these questions because you’re actually playing a video game designed to increase your media literacy. Co-created by Anahita Dalmia, a member of the Rotary Club of Newport Beach, California, USA, the game Agents of Influence is being developed to help 11- to 13-year-olds think critically about what they see on social media and in the news.

“We’re teaching kids to understand media bias, logical fallacies, and confirmation bias. We teach things like reading closely — tools you can use to determine what to trust online,” says Dalmia, the founder and CEO of game developer Alterea Inc.

Experts interviewed for this story recommended several nonpartisan fact-checking sites. Here are a few:

• PolitiFact, a Pulitzer Prize-winning site run by the Poynter Institute, a nonprofit school for journalists
• Full Fact, a London, England-based factchecking site
• Snopes, a source of information on urban legends and online rumors since 1994
• FactCheck.org, a nonprofit project of the Annenberg Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, USA

• Dalmia, a third-generation Rotarian, says the game’s approach was inspired partly by Rotary’s Four-Way Test.

  “The first question is, ‘Is it the truth?’ And there’s a reason that’s the first question,” Dalmia says. “If it’s not the truth, you cannot make a strong judgment call based on any of the other questions, because you’re starting on an unstable foundation.”

  “An unstable foundation” is one way to describe the current state of the media landscape. Experts say we’re exposed to far more media than ever before. That includes both misinformation (unintentional untruths) and disinformation (deliberate falsehoods meant to mislead people). Although many outlets are responsible and credible, figuring out what to believe can take time and effort.

  “Before the internet, if I went to get a newspaper, it was run by journalists for whom truth was an important standard. Of course newspapers were biased. But today, people who want to believe things just post stuff,” says Alan Dennis, a professor of internet systems at Indiana University.

  “There are active disinformation campaigns by foreign governments designed to influence voters in democratic countries. The actors have become much more sophisticated, and they have learned quite a bit about what messaging works.”

  People are aware of this problem, and they say they want to become savvier about the media they consume. A study released this year found that about seven in 10 Americans were interested in learning how to better distinguish between true and false information online. But media literacy is more than just separating fact from fiction.

  “We need to be able to judge things like, ‘What’s the bias behind it? Who created it? Who’s benefiting from it?’ So there’s not a simple fix here,” says Jeff Share, a lecturer at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a co-author of “The Critical Media Literacy Guide.” “We need to slow down and investigate. It might mean it’s going to take me a couple more minutes, but I can go to some different sources. I can also recognize that some are more legitimate than others.”

• Training storytellers

  Many people believe that ideological biases and financial interests guide major news outlets’ coverage, says global grant scholar Alex Freeman, who is pursuing a master’s degree in global media and communications at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

  “It’s one of the big reasons that people have turned against media, but I think it’s an overcorrection,” Freeman says. “A lot of people have turned to independent journalists who are more willing to incorporate their own personal experience into their reporting. But without a traditional media apparatus — without standard practices for ensuring accuracy — it’s hard to know who’s trustworthy.”

  Still, independent voices can be crucial in places where media organizations lack funding or are restricted by repressive governments. When Rotary Peace Fellow Thomas Sithole realized his hometown in Zimbabwe was ignored by major media outlets, he launched a community radio station. Then he founded the Zimbabwe Centre for Media and Information Literacy to teach people to think more critically and tell their own stories effectively. He believes the two skills are intertwined.

  “We tell citizens how to arm themselves against disinformation and misinformation,” he says. The Centre also trains citizen journalists and other content creators, teaching skills like fact-checking and ensuring balance in a story.

  “We’re trying to build a movement across the region, because we see that there is no appetite from our governments to push for policies that support media and information literacy among citizens,” Sithole says.

  The threat of artificial intelligence

  Even as he trains an army of storytellers, Sithole worries that the arrival of artificial intelligence will make it easier to create and spread disinformation.

  “For unsuspecting citizens, it’s creating a lot of challenges,” he says. “It becomes very difficult now to tell whether a piece of content is true or false, especially if it’s in the form of videos or images. It’s something that is really a challenge even to the professional journalist.”

  Some believe the key is educating younger media consumers. Erin McNeill meets many students through her job as CEO of the U.S.-based nonprofit Media Literacy Now, and she’s heartened by what she finds. “AI is definitely making it harder to identify good and credible sources,” McNeill says. But she says people can use the same skills to analyze human-generated and AI-generated content.

  “Young people are so creative and smart. We’re educating them so they can rise to the challenge,” she says. “They’re going to find solutions as long as they’re given the skills and the education they need.”

  The same belief animates Dalmia as she continues to develop and promote Agents of Influence. She has presented the game to numerous Rotary clubs and hopes Rotarians will encourage their local schools to use it. “This started as a passion project, but there was a huge demand from parents who were concerned about how social media was shaping their kids’ perspectives and interactions with the outside world,” Dalmia says. “The resounding feedback we’ve gotten is, ‘Can I have this for my kid who thinks TikTok is a reliable source of information?’”

  Learn about Rotary’s work to support education and promote peace.

Visit :-

https://www.rotary.org/en/beyond-truth-vs-fiction-media

Stand by me: The value of peer-to-peer support

 

Stand by me: The value of peer-to-peer support

Mary Lawal, a 22-year-old psychology student, had to advocate for herself to access treatment for bipolar and borderline personality disorders that had gone undiagnosed for years. Today, she’s a mental health advocate, sharing her story with audiences and leading youth peer support groups.

Image credit: Richard Williams

On TikTok and on campus, students with mental health struggles are finding support among each other

By James Hider

For years, Mary Lawal endured the dismissive remarks. She’s just a moody teenager. It’s just the hormones. She’s acting out for attention. Someone must have gotten her period. None of the adults in her life seemed to understand that her flashes of anger, intrusive thoughts, and even her attempts to take her own life were signs of a serious mental health condition.

But there were people who understood, plenty of them, other young people who had gone through similar experiences. And after what she describes as “so many years of struggle,” Lawal found them, on YouTube and all over social media. Her journey to recovery began there, with a sense of connection to people whose stories sounded like hers and who had found help. “I didn’t feel as alone,” she says. “I felt like someone saw me.”

Now 22, the college student living in the Washington, D.C., suburbs in Maryland is in treatment and recovery for bipolar and borderline personality disorders that had gone undiagnosed for years. She has become a mental health advocate, sharing her story with audiences and leading youth peer support groups, and she is working toward a psychology degree.

Like Lawal, many young people are turning to social media to share their mental health struggles and seek advice. It’s one form of peer-to-peer support gaining attention as a much-needed missing link between people with mental health needs and professional care. At high schools, on college campuses, on social media, and even within online video gaming platforms, young people are finding — and offering — support. Research is recognizing that peer support can be an important first step in overcoming barriers to care, including social isolation, mistrust of formal health care, and difficult home environments and other challenging circumstances.

Schools, nonprofits, and other types of community-based organizations, including Rotary clubs around the world, are tapping into that potential. “We need to focus on our youth,” says Dr. Geetha Jayaram, a professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and a member of the Rotary Action Group on Mental Health Initiatives. “That spirit of wanting to do something for somebody else, our youth have it, and I don’t think we’re harnessing it enough.”

Last fall, Jayaram’s club, Howard West in Maryland, and six other Rotary clubs in the area organized a youth mental health summit for students throughout the area. In an auditorium at Howard Community College, outside Baltimore, dozens of young people listened to speakers addressing topics related to peer support: suicide prevention; how to recognize, prevent, and find treatment for depression, anxiety, and substance use disorders; and how to administer naloxone, the opioid overdose reversal medicine.

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The COVID-19 pandemic has had profound and lingering effects on young people’s mental health, throwing millions into isolation at a time when their development depends on interacting with their peers. Jayaram says the full impact of that may not even have emerged yet, since it can take years for mental health problems to manifest in ways that push someone to seek professional help.

In the U.S., about 20 percent of surveyed teens reported symptoms of major depressive disorder in 2021, the first full year of the pandemic, but fewer than half of those who needed treatment received it, according to an analysis of survey data published in JAMA Pediatrics. Adolescents belonging to racial and ethnic minority groups had the least access to treatment.

Lawal says that for a long time when she was growing up she didn’t realize mental health care was an option for an African American girl. There were no answers to be found in her schools, where guidance counselors, she says, were focused solely on academics.

Left: Lawal (left) testifies at a 2023 U.S. congressional hearing in support of a bill related to mental health services in schools. Right: Lawal (second from right) poses with House members and other participants in the hearing. She also testified before the Maryland Legislature in support of a bill related to the 988 crisis hotline. Images courtesy of Mary Lawal.

There were also barriers in her own family. She was only 8 years old when she first tried to take her life. Yet, she struggled to get her parents to understand what she was going through, a battle exacerbated by being shuttled between her father’s home in Nigeria and her mother’s in the United States. “They didn’t really understand,” she says. “Because of our cultural background, they had difficulties accepting my mental health struggle, so they would tell me to pray it away, to use my faith to overcome it,” she says. They also didn’t want her to talk about it with anyone outside of the house — they believed such things were best kept in the family.

Things reached a turning point at the start of the pandemic. “For two weeks, there were a lot of tears and I said, ‘If I’m your daughter and you love me, you should get me the help I need.’” Eventually, they understood, and she found a psychiatrist, who prescribed therapy and medication and taught her coping skills. Today, Lawal is an active advocate nationally, serving on a 10-member young adult advisory group at the National Alliance on Mental Illness, as well as in her community. She also has testified before the Maryland Legislature and the U.S. Congress in support of bills related to the 988 crisis hotline and mental health services in schools.

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Examples of peer support in mental health go back several centuries with the periodic practice of hiring recovered patients as staff members at psychiatric hospitals. The concept has expanded globally in recent decades with a focus on young people, a vulnerable population that has been particularly hard to reach. As a result, peer support is showing up in some unexpected places.

Twitch, the livestreaming platform focused on video gaming, is home to a variety of channels hosted by young people who have experienced mental health challenges and who chat and exchange stories with others. One channel, called Anxiety Tonight, lightheartedly bills itself as “live mental breakdowns nightly.”

Nonprofit organizations also offer and promote peer-to-peer support groups. One of them, Youth Era, trains young people who have their own experiences of either drug use or issues like depression and suicidal ideation to reach out to other young people who may be suffering in isolation.

Martin Rafferty, the group’s founder, says the organization holds online forums and actively goes out to find at-risk groups, rather than waiting for people to come seeking help. “It’s scary out there right now for young people,” he said in a recent interview with KOIN-TV news in Portland, Oregon. “A lot of adults can understand that they didn’t grow up in the same world that young people are growing up in today. School shootings, addictions, climate change, these are things that are on the minds of all high school students, all middle school students. Our message is really clear: Don’t go it alone.”

And on TikTok and other popular social media platforms, influencers focused on mental health are practicing their own brand of peer support, offering viewers everything from advice on surviving breakups to personal accounts of depression narrated with wry humor.

In formalized programs, peer support specialists go through many hours of training. But even with the informal sharing communities online, the benefits seem to outweigh the risks, which include exposure to misleading information or hostile comments. For instance, people interacting online can remain anonymous if they choose, shielding them from the fear of judgment in face-to-face encounters.

Ultimately, peer sharing should be seen as a bridge to formal, professional care, cautions Dr. Karen Swartz, a Johns Hopkins professor of psychiatry and another of the presenters at the Rotary clubs’ youth mental health summit in September. Most young people will experience some periods of depression or anxiety, but when they recur frequently enough to affect a person’s lifestyle and choices, that is when they need to seek out professional help, Swartz says.

She notes that, without treatment, a depressive episode could last months. “In that time, you maybe decided you were not a good student, you were not a good athlete, maybe you shouldn’t try to do that program in college, says Swartz. “So it can change the trajectory people are on, change how they feel about their future.” Having a peer recognize the signs of struggle and encourage treatment could have a huge effect.

Though young people are successfully sifting through social channels to find credible mental health information, including from doctors explaining specific disorders and symptoms, the electronic devices can also decrease in-person connection. And persistent use has potential negative effects from “doomscrolling” and exposure to distressing images and other content. Nina Mezu-Nwaba, a longtime Rotarian and a pharmacist who demonstrated how to use the opioid overdose treatment at the September youth summit, says that during the pandemic she was advising young people to take breaks from the news and social media. “I’d have people call and say, ‘I’m crying, this is just too much, I can’t take it anymore, people are dying everywhere.’” Too much time spent on digital media or media multitasking are behaviors that friends and family in peer support roles can be on the lookout for.

It can be hard, however, for parents to spot signs of depression. Experts say that in young children, it can be especially difficult, since anxiety or depression can manifest itself in ways parents might not equate with mental health issues: headaches, stomachaches, not wanting to go to school, acting out in class, or fear of being away from their most trusted people.

Fellow students who are aware of the signs can help. At a basic level, these skills don’t require hours and hours of professional training. The Rotary Action Group on Mental Health Initiatives, for instance, developed a toolkit for use in schools called Wellness in a Box.

Through videos, workshops, and group discussions, Wellness in a Box presents information to students, parents, and teachers about depression and suicide, activities to foster coping skills, and how to seek help.

Left: Dr. Geetha Jayaram, a professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and a member of the Rotary Action Group on Mental Health Initiatives. Image credit: Richard Williams. Right: Last fall, Jayaram’s club, Howard West in Maryland, and six other Rotary clubs in the area organized a youth mental health summit. Dozens of young people listened to speakers addressing topics related to peer support, including suicide prevention and how to recognize signs of depression and anxiety. Courtesy of Geetha Jayaram.

Consulting psychologist Rita Aggarwal, an officer of the action group and a member of the Rotary Club of Nagpur, India, has applied the toolkit in her hometown. A community assessment carried out by members of the action group and a study published in the Indian Journal of Psychological Medicine both found that mental health literacy among young people in India was very low.

The project, which led to Aggarwal’s selection this year as one of Rotary’s People of Action: Champions of Impact, created a curriculum for 14-year-olds that covered depression awareness and ideas for coping. “Many of the students were unaware of counseling and how it works,” Aggarwal says. “But they had a desire to speak out, share, and be heard.” The project taught teachers counseling skills and educated parents, and 100 young people have volunteered for further training as peer mentors.

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Lawal says that even after she was in therapy, her mother didn’t always seem to accept that her illness was real. It was only after hearing similar stories from other young people, including other young African American women, at Lawal’s speaking events that the idea finally seemed to click, she says. “She hadn’t understood that it’s something that can happen to anyone.” Some of her speaking engagements are focused on audiences of parents for just that reason.

Today, Lawal, who loves swimming, posting photos on Instagram, and podcasting, is planning to become a clinical psychologist. She is open about her mental health journey and says that she continues to rely on support. She sometimes calls 988 or texts the Crisis Text Line (741741 in the U.S.) when she needs help, someone to talk to, or a reminder about how to de-escalate.

Her biggest wish is to reach even just one young person at a support session or speaking event with words that could help them through their journey. “I want my story to be the difference.”

Most of all, she wants them to see in her a real-life example of recovery, to know it’s possible. “I tell them to know that you have a reason why you’re on this earth, you have a purpose, you have a plan, and your story isn’t over yet.”

This is an abridged version of a story that originally appeared in the May 2024 issue of Rotary magazine.

Visit :-

https://www.rotary.org/en/stand-me-value-peer-peer-support

 

Rotary lanceert nieuwe wervingscampagne

Rotary in Nederland heeft een nieuwe wervingscampagne gelanceerd om haar missie sterker onder de aandacht te brengen en nieuwe leden aan te trekken. De campagne richt zich op het zichtbaar maken van de unieke waarden van Rotary—kameraadschap, maatschappelijke betrokkenheid en dienstbaarheid—en introduceert tegelijkertijd een modernere, flexibele aanpak.

Een eigentijdse online aanwezigheid

Om de campagne een solide basis te geven, is de homepage van Rotary.nl vernieuwd en is de pagina “Lid worden” volledig herzien. Hier kunnen bezoekers eenvoudig kennismaken met de kern van Rotary en ontdekken hoe zij zelf betrokken kunnen raken. De eerste social media posts zijn al live, en binnenkort worden deze aangevuld met pakkende video’s en gerichte advertenties. Hiermee wordt Rotary op verschillende platformen in de spotlight gezet, waardoor een breder publiek bereikt wordt.

Praktische hulpmiddelen binnen handbereik

Rotary heeft een speciale pagina ingericht waar clubs direct toegang hebben tot een reeks handige middelen en tools: Rotary.nl/leden/Wervingscampagne. Hier vinden leden alles wat ze nodig hebben om de campagne lokaal en online uit te rollen. Van professioneel ontworpen templates en presentaties tot kant-en-klare social media posts—het is allemaal beschikbaar. Zo kunnen clubs zonder moeite hun eigen acties organiseren en nieuwe leden aanspreken.

Inspiratie en ondersteuning

Maandelijks verschijnt er een inspiratienieuwsbrief met succesvolle voorbeelden, praktische tips en de nieuwste ontwikkelingen. Door deze regelmatige updates blijven clubs op de hoogte van wat er speelt en kunnen ze leren van best practices van anderen. Dit zorgt ervoor dat de campagne voortdurend wordt verfijnd en geoptimaliseerd.

Oproep aan clubs en leden: ondersteun de campagne!

Rotary Nederland roept alle clubs en leden op om actief mee te doen aan de nieuwe wervingscampagne. Dit is hét moment om gezamenlijk onze boodschap verder te verspreiden en nieuwe leden te inspireren.

Hoe kun jij bijdragen?

• Deel de campagneposters en -berichten op social media:
  Help onze boodschap te verspreiden door de officiële campagneposters en berichten te delen via jouw club- en persoonlijke kanalen.
• Gebruik de beschikbare middelen:
  Maak gebruik van de tools die Rotary beschikbaar heeft gesteld op Rotary.nl/leden/Wervingscampagne. Van social media templates tot inspirerende PowerPoint-presentaties—je vindt alles wat je nodig hebt om direct aan de slag te gaan.
• Organiseer lokale acties: Geef de campagne een gezicht in jouw regio. Organiseer bijvoorbeeld een open clubbijeenkomst, deel succesverhalen uit jouw gemeenschap of creëer originele content die aansluit bij de kernwaarden van Rotary.

Samen maken we het verschil

Met jouw hulp wordt deze campagne nog krachtiger. Door samen in actie te komen en de boodschap breed te verspreiden, trekken we nieuwe leden aan en laten we zien dat Rotary een beweging is die echt impact maakt. Dus waar wacht je nog op? Haak in op de campagne, deel de posts en laat samen Rotary groeien!

Visit for more details :-

https://www.rotary.nl/magazines/202502/nieuwe-wervingscampagne/

Pablo Ruiz Amo Invitado a hablar en el instituto de Chicago Rotario!

¡Estupendas noticias!
Queridos amigos, tengo el honor de deciros que he sido invitado por nuestro presidente de Rotary International 2013-2014 Ron Burton para hablar en el instituto de Chicago que tendrá lugar el próximo marzo.
En este instituto, los Coordinadores Rotarios, los Coordinadores de la Fundación Rotaria y los Coordinadores de Imagen Publica de todo el mundo se reunirán para desarrollar la estrategia a seguir para el año rotario 2013-2014.
Este es un gran honor para todos nosotros ya que seré el único español que asistirá al evento.
Haré todo lo posible para tratar de grabarlo para compartirlo con todos vosotros.
Aquí tenéis la invitación! Besos y Viva Rotary!

http://www.slideshare.net/PabloAmo/pablo-ruiz-invited-to-speak-at-rotary-institute-chicago