A New Kind of Civics

http://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/22/opinion/a-new-kind-of-civics.html

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To the Editor:

Re “For Tech-Savvy Students, Apathy to Current Events Is a Thing of the Past” (news article, Feb. 15):

I was delighted to read that more high school students are informing themselves about politics and government since the election of Donald Trump. But their teachers need to supplement the information that students get from their news feeds, which curate the world in accord with our preferences and biases.

Fed by these media echo chambers, Americans have increasingly segregated themselves into cocoons of the like-minded. Only our schools can break that cycle, by exposing young citizens to information they do not like.

It won’t be easy. But it’s never been more necessary.

JONATHAN ZIMMERMAN

Philadelphia

The writer is a professor of history of education at the University of Pennsylvania.