State of Media Literacy Education Report 2024

NAMLE’s Snapshot 2024: Media Literacy Education in the United States measures media literacy content, standards, and perceptions from a variety of educators. The Snapshot reflects findings from our 2023 state of media literacy survey, open from July-September 2023, and considers deep contextual understanding of recent developments in research and policy, education, and public understanding of media literacy, so we can begin to better understand:

• What has changed in United States’ media literacy education?
• What has improved?
• What has become more challenging?
• Where do we go from here?

While the full report details a range of findings, key takeaways include:

• Time and resources remain the primary challenges for teaching media literacy education.
• Despite those and other challenges, educators who took the survey reported spending on average 11 hours per week intentionally teaching media literacy.
• The wide array of resources, lessons and curriculum available is both a boon and an obstacle, as educators report needing help to make sense of resources within the context of their existing curriculum or content areas.
• More educators are taking advantage of professional development, badging and certificate opportunities to increase their knowledge of media literacy education.
• Educators surveyed reported that topics related to discerning high quality information are the most prominent in their media literacy courses and programs.
• State requirements to teach media literacy have made headway, but ongoing concern exists regarding what different policies mean and how to implement and fund them.

These findings—in tandem with analysis of developments in education, policy, and public understanding of media literacy since 2019, also included in the Snapshot—lead NAMLE to the issue the following recommendations: