This September, the Library Foundation of Hillsboro hosted a free, three-part Media and Information Literacy series at the Brookwood Library.
The series brought our community together for some timely and important conversations about how we find, evaluate, and understand the information we encounter every day.
We kicked things off with a screening of the award-winning documentary Trust Me!, which offered a great introduction to the topic of media literacy and showed the real-life impact that false information can have on our health and civic life. After the screening, we were joined by Rosemary Smith of the Getting Better Foundation and Impact Producer of the film, along with Professor Emeritus David LaPorte, for a spirited and informative discussion.
If you missed the event, Trust Me! is available to watch for free on Kanopy with your library card.
The Oregonian/Oregon Live Editor Laura Gunderson joined us for the second event and shared how the newspaper is balancing the demands of a fast-paced news environment with the need to provide reliable, fact-based information to readers. She also had some exciting news to share: The Oregonian is re-opening its Washington County bureau!
For our final event, Lee Shaker, PhD, Chair of the PSU Communications Department, gave a fascinating presentation based on his research into the intersection of emerging media technology and politics. He introduced the audience to terms such as “pink slime sites.”
Pink slime sites mimic authoritative news sources but are funded by industry groups with a vested interest in the topic or individuals seeking only financial gain. These sites now outnumber legitimate news sites, and their misinformation is regularly picked up, and repeated, by AI.
We were so pleased by the community’s participation and engagement throughout the series.
We look forward to bringing more media and information literacy events to Hillsboro!