NC's New Social Media Literacy Law

Media literacy educators and activists will undoubtedly be debating the merits (and the shortcomings) of the new state law, passed in North Carolina as House Bill 959 (the “Protecting Students in a Digital Age” Act), which was signed into law by Governor Josh Stein just days ago. 

The law restricts digital device use during class, unless a teacher authorizes them for educational use, or they are needed for emergency purposes, or if required by students with special needs. It also mandates the implementation of a “social media literacy” curriculum, beginning in the 2026 - 2027 school year. 

Watch WKAL News to Learn More 

Starting in the 2026–27 school year, schools must include social media literacy lessons in the required curriculum, once in elementary and middle school, and twice in high school. Curriculum must cover the effects of media on mental and physical health (including addiction), misinformation and manipulation tactics, cyberbullying, personal security, and human trafficking, the permanence of online content, and interpersonal skills and character education. Furthermore, school board staff and school employees are forbidden to use TIkTok for any school-related duties on school-issued devices or networks. The NC Department of Public Instruction will issue guidance to help districts implement these mandates.

State Laws Help Advance Innovation in Education

Passing this law is a commendable step towards building the media literacy competencies of students in North Carolina. The law is intended to improve student focus and mental health by reducing digital distractions during class. It can also promote digital safety by educating students on risks and responsible online behavior, and sensitize students to the potentially addictive or harmful social media content that can affect their beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors. According to Media Literacy Now, North Carolina is among a growing number of states who are mandating laws that advance media literacy education in public schools. 

Legal requirements are important because they create equity of access to media literacy education. It’s important that all students—not just the lucky ones—receive exposure to media literacy education. For educators who have been avoiding the topic, this law makes it clear that schools must engage students in open, critical dialogue about digital life. In the years ahead, the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction can take important strategic actions to meet real student needs.
 

What Can Go Wrong

But unfortunately, the law has a strong likelihood of not achieving its goals if teachers do not receive the training and support they will need to implement the program. That’s because the law mandates curriculum without providing funding to support professional development programs. 

Here’s what we’ve learned from more than three decades of research on media literacy education: Teachers who have not learned to use media literacy instructional practices and who are unfamiliar with the nuances of social media ecosystems are likely to default to moralizing instead of facilitating critical inquiry. For students who engage with social media constantly outside of school, a “one-size-fits-all” approach to curriculum is unlikely to be engaging or relevant. And formal lesson plans and curriculum materials are likely to be outdated even before they are published. If students don’t see school instruction as credible or useful, they won’t apply it critically in real-world digital settings.
 

That’s why I hope that deeper investment in teacher professional development will be key to the success of North Carolina’s social media literacy education initiative. To build student knowledge and skills at any age, instructional practices of media literacy education rely on adaptive, context-rich dialogue and discussion. Students also need opportunities to critically examine the many benefits (not just the risks and harms) of social media platforms. True critical thinking involves evaluating sources, challenging narratives, and practicing discernment—not just being told “this is bad.”

Requiring two or four isolated lessons per year risks turning media literacy into a checkbox subject rather than an embedded skill across disciplines. That’s already the case with the current approach to online safety that’s mandated by E-rate funding. Since 1998, North Carolina’s schools and libraries have received more than $1 billion in E-rate discounts. The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction supports a School Connectivity Team who provide schools with help in completing the massive paperwork that schools and libraries need to complete to receive subsidized telecommunication services. But sadly, the e-rate mandate to provide online safety education is little more than a check-the-box thing in many school districts. Critical thinking about media must be practiced regularly in K-12 history, ELA, civics, science and health education, and not confined to occasional digital literacy workshops.

What’s Needed for the Future 

Even imperfect laws can serve as a starting point to create the infrastructure and expectations for future, deeper integration of media and digital literacy in North Carolina public schools. What’s the best way to continue to build the knowledge, skills, and habits of mind of North Carolina students? Let me count the ways: 

• Teach students to be ethical creators, informed consumers, and digital citizens—not just to avoid danger
• Integrate media literacy across the K-12 curriculum and ensure that it is fully addressed in teacher training programs across the state
• Partner with the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation and others to develop a cadre of teacher leaders who offer sustained professional development in media literacy, algorithmic awareness, digital ethics, and contemporary youth media trends
• Support the work of North Carolina students who create and critique their own podcasts, social media campaigns, or video essays analyzing digital content and controversies, like the Media Wise team created by the Poynter Institute
• Inspire teachers to make widespread use of open-ended discussions that develop reasoning, debate, empathy, and self-awareness—all core to critical thinking.
• Create videos to demonstrate how to make educational use of social media by helping teachers and students develop algorithmic awareness by tracking how a fresh TikTok or YouTube account “learns” preferences and changes over time. Understanding how social influence is designed helps students question—not just react to—the content they consume
• For both teachers and students, build deeper understanding of social media systems and the financial incentives that promote addictive uses through simulations and role playing that enable the evaluation of digital platforms (and the businesses that design them) from different perspectives
• Engage students in crafting classroom or schoolwide digital policies and the enforcement of new norms so they have agency in self-regulation and boundary-setting 
• Help students and teachers appreciate the value of social media as a tool for democratic self-governance, and critically examine how it is used to gain power, influence, and advance social change. 

Legal actions like North Carolina’s new “social media literacy” law (HB 959) are a step in the right direction toward advancing media literacy in American public schools. They signal an important cultural shift that teaching students to critically engage with digital media is not optional, but essential. While laws like HB 959 may have limitations, they lay important groundwork for institutionalizing media literacy, scaling best practices, and helping students navigate a rapidly evolving digital landscape with clarity, confidence, and curiosity.