Turning a Children’s Rating System Into an Advocacy Army
New York Times | Technology | NATASHA SINGER | APRIL 26, 2015
Abstract : On Monday, the group plans to introduce an even more ambitious national advocacy effort, called Common Sense Kids Action, to push for certain state and federal efforts to bolster education for children. After years of providing free children’s entertainment ratings, Common Sense Media now hopes to galvanize its user base, asking consumers to get behind issues like technical career training for students and technology training for teachers.
Already, Mr. Steyer has teamed up with some of the biggest players in technology and education. With financing from the MacArthur Foundation and the Sherwood Foundation, for instance, his group developed a digital literacy curriculum that Mr. Steyer says has been adopted by about 90,000 schools. With financing from Bill Gates, it created a review site for digital education tools that effectively functions as a Yelp for teachers. The group also recently spearheaded the passage of two data protection laws in California that limit how online companies can use information they collect from children and students.
