new course on fact-checking at Asia’s oldest university

On the occasion of the 58th World Communications Day, the University of Santo Tomas (UST) announced the new proposal, which will begin next academic year. Prof. Felipe Salvosa II explained that its objective is to provide tools to evaluate “the impact of disinformation and incorrect information on the democratic system.” The course “Digital Literacy, Fact-Checking, and Verification” is also a response to the message in which Pope Francis reflects on the use of Artificial Intelligence.

Manila () – The Pontifical and Royal University of Santo Tomas (UST) – Dominican institution in Manila founded in 1611, which is the oldest university in Asia and the largest Catholic university in the world by the number of students on a single campus – will offer a course on fact-checking and digital literacy to address misinformation in all disciplines starting in the first quarter of the 2024-2025 academic year. The UST Department of Journalism made this announcement yesterday, May 12, 2024, the 58th World Communications Day, celebrated under the theme “Artificial intelligence and wisdom of the heart: for fully human communication.”

Prof. Felipe Salvosa II, coordinator of the Journalism major, says that first-year students of media management and legal management majors will be able to enroll in the new free-choice general education course “Digital Literacy, Fact-Checking , and Verification”. Demand for the course will determine possible expansion in future semesters. “We hope that students will evaluate the impact of misinformation and disinformation on various fields of study and on the democratic system,” Salvosa said. Other topics to be discussed are the use of prevention instruments to guarantee security, digital literacy concepts, verification of the veracity and correctness of material found on the Internet, and the production of original content that includes verified data.

The new course will also “provide students with practical tools to perform online fact-checking and, at the same time, adopt theoretical and contextual approaches to navigate the prevailing information clutter.” Salvosa also said that during the preparation of the new proposal, which lasted more than a year, members of the Faculty received training in data visualization, tools based on artificial intelligence (AI) and instruments for verification and analysis of influence operations. foreigner.

“This also responds to the message from Pope Francis (which was published on January 24 on the occasion of the Conference, ed.) about the need to carefully reflect on the theoretical development and practical use of these new tools of communication and knowledge,” declared Salvosa before yesterday’s conference. Pope Francis said the digital revolution can bring us “a conquest of freedom,” adding that the wise application of AI can help society fight the age-old “problem of misinformation.” The Pope also stated in the message that “the use of artificial intelligence will be able to contribute positively to the field of communication if it does not nullify the role of journalism on the ground, but, on the contrary, supports it.”

UST instituted the first Philippine Journalism program in 1929. It is one of the two programs in the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters that has been certified by the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) University Network Quality Assurance for its ability to provide high-quality education and generate research results worthy of note. In 2013 and 2016 the Philippine Commission on Higher Education recognized the UST program as a Journalism Development Center.

Photo: Flickr / Ojie Paloma