(1)(a) The office of the superintendent of public instruction shall establish a grant program for the purposes of supporting media literacy and digital citizenship through school district leadership teams. The office of the superintendent of public instruction shall establish and publish criteria for the grant program, and may accept gifts, grants, or endowments from public or private sources for the grant program.

(b) A school district that receives a grant under this section is not prohibited from receiving a grant in subsequent grant cycles.

(2)(a) For a school district to qualify for a grant under this section, the grant proposal must provide that the grantee create a district leadership team that develops a curriculum unit on media literacy or digital citizenship, or both, that may be integrated into one of the following areas:

(i) Social studies;

(ii) English language arts; or

(iii) Health.

(b) School districts selected under the grant program are expected to evaluate the curriculum unit they develop under this subsection (2).

(c) In developing their curriculum unit, school districts selected under the grant program are encouraged to work with school district teacher-librarians or a school district library information technology program, if applicable.

(3) The establishment of the grant program under this section is subject to the availability of amounts appropriated for this specific purpose.

(4) The curriculum unit developed under this section must be made available as an open educational resource.

(5)(a) Up to 10 grants a year awarded under this section must be for establishing media literacy professional learning communities with the purpose of sharing best practices in the subject of media literacy.

(b)(i) Grant recipients under this subsection (5) are required to develop an online presence for their community to model new strategies and to share ideas, challenges, and successful practices.

(ii) Grant recipients shall attend the group meetings created by the office of the superintendent of public instruction under (c) of this subsection (5).

(c) The office of the superintendent of public instruction shall convene group meetings for the purpose of sharing best practices and strategies in media literacy education.

(d) Additional activities permitted for the use of these grants include, but are not limited to:

(i) Organizing teachers from across a school district to develop new instructional strategies and to share successful strategies;

(ii) Sharing successful practices across a group of school districts; and

(iii) Facilitating coordination between educational service districts and school districts to provide training.

(6)(a) At least one grant awarded in each award cycle must be for developing and using a curriculum that contains a focus on synthetic media as a major component.

(b) For the purposes of this section, “synthetic media” means an image, an audio recording, or a video recording of an individual’s appearance, speech, or conduct that has been intentionally manipulated with the use of digital technology in a manner to create a realistic but false image, audio, or video.

(7) This section expires July 31, 2031.

Finding—Purpose—2021 c 301: See note following RCW 28A.650.060.