Media, a formally recognized pillar of democracy, is responsible for providing citizens with accurate, timely, and relevant news and information pertinent to their decision-making and civic participation. But media, in theory and practice, evolves alongside the socio-political environment it operates on.
This topic aims to give an overview of media landscapes in Malaysia and the Philippines, focusing on the availability of media, media consumption, credibility of media platforms, regulations, and journalistic practices that influence information circulation.

Governments worldwide had to impose restrictions on physical gatherings since 2020 to limit the spread of COVID-19. The education sector, as a result, had to pivot from face-to-face classroom interactions to remote learning modalities immediately. Amid this pandemic, how would secondary school teachers and educators counter the proliferation of false information and avoid falling victim to fake news? What are the emerging roles of secondary school teachers and teacher educators in the digital classroom, and how might they engage students to participate in ideation meaningfully?

Civic online reasoning is crucial in citizens’ participation in democratic processes. Due to the influence they have in shaping students’ perceptions and beliefs, teachers have an essential role to play in sifting out accurate, reasonable, and independently produced information from biased and politically-motivated content. This session will discuss the process of judging the credibility of online content and develop secondary school teachers’ and teacher educators’ critical thinking skills to evaluate the relevance and reliability of sources.

Media technologies are often used by people who might not have adequate knowledge or skills to use them. The move to educate society, particularly our secondary school teachers and teacher educators (as the principal agent of change), on the importance of media and information literacy came only as an after-thought. The digital age ushers in new rules for acceptable behaviors in an online social environment. This session will talk about online do’s and don’ts that secondary school teachers and teacher educators should adhere to and effective interactions with students that may promote better communication and safeguard individual and organizational reputations.

The use of information and communication technologies had been harnessed amidst the pandemic and emergencies. This is to assure the learning continuity of school children amidst the challenging scenarios. This topic will explore a myriad of media and information literacy initiatives in the time of pandemic and emergencies. It will present and highlight best practices in the Southeast Asian region for teachers’ and teacher educators’ considerations. Also, it will address challenges and issues and their possible solutions and actions to address them considering the educational landscape particularly of Malaysia and Philippines.

How to keep young people’s data safe, private, and protected while harnessing the benefits of remote education? This topic will discuss common threats to personal security online, the importance of respecting privacy, ethical and legal boundaries of data collection, and building a positive online presence.

Being “media and information literate” is a basic condition for full productive participation in society.
A media and information literate citizenry should manifest at least a minimum competency. This
means, as an individual, having the necessary knowledge, skills and attitudes to act adequately in a specific situation. In this case: to move actively, creatively, critically and consciously in media-information-based society in view of your social participation. This session will share an example of a developed MIL Competency Framework as a reference for teacher and teacher educators.