In the News: Meyer Helps WKBW Kick Off National News Literacy Week

Brian Meyer, lecturer in Buffalo State College’s Communication Department, brought a glimpse of his COM 100 Media Literacy class to WKBW-TV Channel 7 for National News Literacy Week, an initiative started last year by the News Literacy Project and the E. W. Scripps Company.

Meyer was featured in the station’s first story in a weeklong series of topics related to building trust among news consumers and helping them discern misinformation and disinformation. Speaking with reporter Eileen Buckley, Meyer noted a few examples of media tall tales that he uses as discussion points for his students, such as the age-old myths of Elvis being alive and Walt Disney’s body being cryogenically frozen, as well as a photograph of former President Harry Truman holding a newspaper with the false headline “Dewey Defeats Truman.”

Two of Meyer’s COM 100 students, Maggie Tripp and Santia Myles, shared their perspectives as modern news consumers and producers on how social media and local news play roles in determining the accuracy of information.

“On social media, you never know what’s real or what someone just wants to get views,” Tripp said.

“What’s big for me is local news,” Myles said, “because if you know what’s going on in your backyard, you can kind of figure out what’s going on nationally.”

Meyer is an award-winning veteran of local journalism, with over four decades of media experience in the print, radio, video, and digital arenas, including 16 years at the Buffalo News and three years at WBFO-FM.

Photo credit: National Archives and Records Administration, Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and Museum; Accession Number 95-187.