In any major, 91探花students learn to evaluate sources, use texts responsibly and understand the impacts of information. The rise in fake news and misinformation creates an even greater need for these skills, in and beyond the classroom.
At the same time, the topic itself can be an effective and timely way to engage students. Some instructors have been incorporating fake news and misinformation into their courses so students develop critical thinking skills and, in some cases, come up with concrete solutions to the problem.
鈥淐alling Bullshit鈥 arms students at the 91探花and beyond with tools to spot BS, wherever it appears
鈥淥ur world is saturated in bullshit,鈥 begins the syllabus for INFO 198/BIOL 106B, the cross-listed 鈥淐alling Bullshit: Data Reasoning in a Digital World,鈥 designed and taught by Carl Bergstrom, professor in Biology and Jevin West, assistant professor in the Information School. The course鈥檚 objective? To help students 鈥渓earn to detect and defuse it.鈥
Bergstrom and West have been collaborators for years, and had long talked about a problem they both noticed in STEM higher education: in Bergstrom鈥檚 terms, that 鈥淲e do a really good job teaching the mechanics of subjects. But we鈥檙e not teaching students to engage with uncertainty and weigh different arguments against each other. That鈥檚 a really big problem because it makes us particularly vulnerable where numbers are concerned.鈥
So in winter 2017, they decided to create a course that would teach habits of mind more commonly connected with Humanities fields 鈥 engaging uncertainty, questioning evidence 鈥 to STEM students. But almost as soon as the course launched that spring, it became something much bigger: a course about approaching information critically, applicable to any discipline.
Meeting a need for BS detection skills 鈥 and going viral
鈥淐alling Bullshit,鈥 first offered as a one-credit course, attracted students from a wide range of disciplines. When Bergstrom and West taught it a second time, in fall 2017 as a full-fledged three-credit course, enrolled students represented over 40 different majors.
And its impact has extended well beyond their classroom 鈥 far beyond the UW. Before launching the course, Bergstrom and West created a robust website with all course materials accessible to other institutions and to the general public. The course has gone viral, with new courses being explicitly modeled on 鈥淐alling Bullshit鈥 at over 70 universities and high schools around the nation, and across the disciplinary landscape. West says they鈥檝e been surprised and excited to hear from so many people 鈥攕tudents, teachers, retirees 鈥 who have watched their lectures, read course texts and found the course interesting and valuable. In under two years, the course鈥檚 Twitter account has garnered over 8,000 followers 鈥 and the course website has been viewed 1.5 million times.
Empowering students to detect BS, in any field
The course鈥檚 learning goals make it easy to see why the course is filling a need for so many students at so many institutions; these include, 鈥淩emain vigilant for bullshit contaminating your information diet,鈥 and 鈥淔igure out for yourself precisely why a particular bit of bullshit is bullshit.鈥
So, what exactly is the 鈥渂ullshit鈥 that students most need tools for detecting? Bergstrom and West say it鈥檚 that which cloaks itself in what we鈥檙e often inclined to treat as 鈥渢ruth鈥: namely, 鈥渟tatistical figures, data graphics, and other forms of presentation intended to persuade by impressing and overwhelming a reader or listener.鈥
As their students discover, detecting bullshit is no easy task. 鈥淲e give them a set of rules for calling BS,鈥 says West, 鈥渓ike 鈥榠f it seems too good to be true, it probably is.鈥 Students feel empowered when they can spot this stuff.鈥 Students are asked to bring in examples of bullshit when they encounter it in daily life. For Bergstrom and West, the goal is for everyone to become effective bullshit detectors.
And these skills have enormous value for students, including in their future careers. 鈥淲hen we talk to big companies, they want people who have these skills to look at a whole situation, take a proposal that鈥檚 on the table and evaluate and challenge that, in a quantitative domain,鈥 says Bergstrom. 鈥淚t鈥檚 an absolutely crucial part of STEM education 鈥 and really, of all education.鈥
Jackson School Task Force tackles the international problem of fake news and misinformation 鈥 and offers solutions
In the Jackson School for International Studies, students have a unique opportunity to enact real change on a pressing social issue: participation in a Jackson School Task Force. In winter 2018, a task force tackled fake news and misinformation 鈥 producing a 100-page report, now accessible online and contributing to the academic conversation on the issue.
鈥淭he New State of the News: Confronting Misinformation in the Digital Age鈥 was designed and taught by Scott Radnitz, associate professor of International Studies and adjunct associate professor of Political Science and Sociology. Task forces, offered every winter quarter to seniors in the International Studies major, are themed around real world problems. Students collaboratively research and write a detailed report directed toward policy makers, and at the end of the quarter, gain professional experience through defending their findings to a visiting subject matter expert.
Engaging students around an urgent and timely topic: U.S. and global disinformation
Radnitz, a political scientist, studies the post-Soviet region; three years ago he started working on a book about the central role of conspiracy theories in post-Soviet states鈥 politics. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a different way of dealing with media in that region,鈥 he says, 鈥渨hen you don鈥檛 know what you can trust.鈥 But something has recently changed, he says: conspiracy theories and fake news have also become more prevalent in the U.S. He decided the issue 鈥 urgent, currently unfolding, and international in scope 鈥 would be prime task force material.
Radnitz suspected the topic would be of special interest to students as well 鈥 and he was right. 鈥淪tudents are engaged in this issue personally because they鈥檙e avid social media users,鈥 he says, 鈥渂ut also because everyone was so immersed in the 2016 presidential election, following the revelations about fake news as they came out. In some ways my students aren鈥檛 that far behind the experts, because everyone鈥檚 trying to catch up and figure it out.鈥
For students, the task force鈥檚 timeliness imbued it with a sense of high stakes 鈥 and also helped develop their research skills. 鈥淐onsidering the immediate nature of fake news and misinformation, we had to keep track of the new material and developments that were emerging every day and basically work in real time,鈥 says participant Oleksandra Makushenko, class of 2018. 鈥淚t provided experience in teamwork, crisis management and working under a strict deadline.鈥
A multi-faceted problem requires a multi-faceted approach
In task force courses, students research an aspect of the larger issue, and then write a section of what becomes a comprehensive report. 鈥淔ake news is a pervasive problem and needs to be tackled from different angles simultaneously,鈥 says Radnitz, so the class decided on three angles early on:
For each topic, students outlined the problem 鈥 for example, for topic A, the individual and social forces that make people susceptible to misinformation. For each topic students also make practical recommendations 鈥 for example, for topic B, on how pressures might be placed on businesses to limit the spread of misinformation.
Some students took international angles to their research. The report includes a comparative case study on public trust of the media in three different countries, and a section on how the Ukrainian government has responded to Russian disinformation. Radnitz says that early on, the class decided that their audience should be policy makers, academics and the U.S. public 鈥 in order to help us 鈥渓earn lessons for how we can confront this problem at home.鈥
Developing student expertise 鈥 and contributing real results
At the end of any task force, an expert in the field visits the class for an evaluation and defense of their findings 鈥 in Radnitz鈥檚 course, former CNN Moscow bureau chief Jill Dougherty. After thorough preparation, students presented their work to Dougherty, and then responded to her questions for over an hour. The benefit of an expert鈥檚 on-the-ground perspective, and the experience of withstanding scrutiny on their research, are part of the unique professional development that task forces offer to Jackson School majors.
鈥淧robably the most important thing I learned,鈥 says Makushenko, 鈥渋s that there is no easy fix for complex problems. It takes time, committed people, substantial resources to address something that is broken in a holistic manner.鈥 Fortunately, some of these committed people are at the UW. Radnitz says he will likely teach a version of the 鈥淭he New State of the News鈥 for his next task force. 鈥淭he issue isn鈥檛 going anywhere,鈥 he says 鈥 and 91探花Jackson School students have expertise that can make a difference.
In required writing courses, students learn to critically evaluate information
All 91探花students, no matter their major, take a course in English composition. In the Expository Writing Program, where most students take a 100-level English course, students learn that writing, reading and research have everything to do with critical thinking: about the information that surrounds us, how arguments are composed, how evidence is used and how context affects meaning.
鈥淎 big part of the work we do in the EWP is teaching students how to effectively collect, evaluate and interpret sources in order to support their writing,鈥 says Denise Grollmus, former EWP assistant director. 鈥淭his has become increasingly important in light of the prevalence of fake news. We focus not only on how students can learn to evaluate information, but also how we can use the issue of fake news to teach these evaluative techniques.鈥
While EWP instructors 鈥 mostly graduate students in the English department 鈥 design their own curricula, all EWP courses share common learning outcomes. These focus on writing but also on habits of mind, including 鈥渆ngaging in analysis 鈥 the close scrutiny and examination of evidence, claims and assumptions 鈥 to explore and support a line of inquiry.鈥
Some EWP instructors use fake news to teach exactly why these skills are so very important. Matthew Hitchman, EWP instructor and assistant director, introduces students to the research process with fake news. 鈥淚 try to move beyond the dichotomy of reliable/unreliable sources, because 鈥榬eliability鈥 often reads as 鈥榓cademic,鈥欌 he says, and students should get comfortable using different types of sources. This means that inevitably, students will encounter bad information 鈥 so Hitchman begins his research sequence by giving students a range of real, faked and satirical sources to evaluate. They then analyze the sources鈥 context, credibility, purpose 鈥 and finally, their biases. Hitchman works with students to carefully define terms such as 鈥榝ake鈥 and 鈥榤isleading,鈥 鈥渨hich are quite distinct from 鈥榖ias,鈥欌 he says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 important to learn that while sources should be scrutinized for forms of bias, there are some types of information that shouldn鈥檛 be entertained
at all.鈥
In addition, says Grollmus, 鈥渂ecause even the most reputable sources can still get it wrong, EWP instructors ask students to consider the credibility of a source鈥檚 citations. We ask them to consider whether an article includes a diverse set of sources, for example, and what the exclusion of certain voices might mean. Our hope is that by training students in these evaluative techniques, we鈥檒l help them become more critical readers and thus better informed citizens.鈥
To ensure that these values stay central to all EWP courses, staff are currently drafting new program mission statements that address pressing social issues, including fake news and misinformation. 鈥淚t鈥檚 an issue that asks all of us to think about sources, be discerning readers and see rhetoric as something with impact and the potential to do harm,鈥 says Emily George, EWP assistant director.
Most students take a composition course through the EWP in their first year; as they continue on as readers and writers in various fields, they carry these skills with them. At the UW, 鈥渃ritical reading, writing and thinking skills aren鈥檛 limited to first year composition, or even to the classroom,鈥 says George. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e part of every student鈥檚 general education.鈥