The International Center for Journalists’ (ICFJ) Disarming Disinformation initiative is a three-year program, supported by the Scripps Howard Fund, that aims to slow the spread of disinformation through multiple programs such as investigative journalism, capacity building and media literacy education. ICFJ partnered with MediaWise from the Poynter Institute to develop and deliver media literacy programming. 

The media literacy training of trainers program accepted global participants for two different cohorts. The participants are community leaders who will educate others on the importance of media literacy and how to apply those skills in real life. The article below is one of five impact stories selected from the first cohort in celebration of media literacy week. 

As Indonesia’s urban centers develop, Zulfa Amira Zaed carries a weight of concern for her fellow Indonesians who live in remote forest regions. She has seen the growing disparity between the urban and remote communities regarding financial opportunities, educational access and technology accessibility. The latter two intertwine as she thinks about the threat of disinformation spreading to communities that may lack the education to learn the skills to discern factual content from scams, coupled with a lack of internet and access to technology.

Helping these communities navigate the challenges proved difficult for Amira Zaed in the past. She did not have the means to reach remote areas and she felt she needed to improve her own media literacy skills.

That changed when Amira Zaed heard of the Disarming Disinformation training of trainers media literacy program led by ICFJ in partnership with MediaWise. She knew this was her opportunity to make the difference she wanted to make.

After attending the online and in-person workshops, she became more experienced with media literacy skills, such as prebunking, debunking and open-source intelligence tools (OSINT), and was prepared to teach them.

“For me, teaching knowledge about (media) literacy and information identification not only makes my audience smarter, but I am the first person to actually benefit from it. I became wiser and smarter. I learned many valuable lessons while teaching the workshop,” said Amira Zaed.

Preparing the workshops

Amira Zaed knew she wanted to reach the Indigenous people of Batin Sembilan and those living in forest areas in Jambi Province, Sumatra Island, Indonesia. To make her workshops as impactful as possible, she needed to be accepted by the community and its local leadership.

She dedicated hours to learning about the people and the critical issues they regularly face, and collaborated with a local leader and a local NGO to reach the target audience. She was accepted into the community, where she spent time getting to know its members, working with them and building trust before conducting her workshops.

Workshop attendees participating in a small group activity (Courtesy: Zulfa Amira Zaed)

What to teach

Amira Zaed had a unique opportunity to teach media literacy because, while the people in these communities have smartphones, they tend to have weak, if any, cellular service and no internet access in their villages. Access to social media and digital information is often intermittent, primarily taking place when they visit local towns. When individuals reach the city, they may use social media for a short time but often lack the skills to distinguish fact from fiction and also find themselves with not enough time to thoroughly research the information they receive. Disinformation reaching the communities ranged from online scams — often with economic implications — to political and social disinformation.

For Amira Zaed, her goal was clear, she wanted to “minimize conflicts between groups, between individuals … and others.” She did not just talk to the participants and present the material, she engaged in discussion with them — which is crucial to the learning process from any teaching perspective.

Amira Zaed encouraged attendees to talk about their experiences with disinformation, what they saw, what they fell for, and how much they want to learn how to not fall victim in the future. She also included various games to keep the participants engaged and learning throughout the entire workshop.

Impact

After any workshop, there is a lingering question about impact. Will the attendees retain and apply the information? How will it affect their lives?

For Amira Zaed, the answer gives hope for the future of media literacy education for remote communities. Shortly after the workshops, a local community leader named Yunani, who was also a participant, was able to prevent one of their community members from falling victim to a scam. She was, prior to the workshops, scammed out of money for a motorbike on social media, but after the training she was able to keep that from happening to someone else. The community member almost handed over nearly all their money on an online marketplace, but after employing media literacy skills, Yunani and the person determined the posting was false information.

“Training like this is very good for reducing conflict among us,” said Aini, a representative of the Batin Sembilan Indigenous group. “I hope all Indigenous people get similar lessons.”

A new initiative emerged among the Indigenous community following Amira Zaed’s work; a testament to her impact. Patrol groups, consisting of five to 10 people who monitor the forests to push out illegal loggers, now take the opportunity to talk about mis- and disinformation with the local people they encounter during their patrol. They exchange tips on media literacy and debunk false information the locals may have encountered. These patrol groups that were once the learners are now becoming the educators.

Workshop participants gather and listen to workshop. (Courtesy: Zulfa Amira Zaed)

Looking ahead

After leading two workshops, Amira Zaed’s work is far from being done. At the end of the workshops, the Indigenous community members asked her for additional and longer classes. They were excited to learn more about media literacy with “diverse themes” – to think critically about more aspects of life where media literacy can be applied.

Amira Zaed’s five-year plan is to “create a forum or community that is digitally and media literate.” She also wants to continue reaching marginalized communities, who are often the targets and topics of disinformation, focusing on these communities so they are not silenced by more powerful forces.

For Amira Zaed, one thing is clear: “Everyone must have adequate insight when processing information obtained from various platforms and must at least be able to carry out fact-checking independently as well as prebunking and debunking.”