We help individuals, communities and institutions navigate our complex information environments.

EDUCATION

An example of a "Troll" card from The Feed game.

CIP community fellow, Fulbright scholar team up to test educational card game at Seattle’s Ballard High School

Q&A INTERVIEW |  10.15.2025

Ballard High School teacher Shawn Lee, a member of the 2024-25 CIP Community Fellowship cohort, teamed up with visiting Fulbright Scholar Scott DeJong to co-develop “The Feed: A Game of Social Media Mischief,” a card game for high school students that explores the various motivations and incentives around sharing social media content. Their collaboration is a great example of how pairing insights from academic research and professional practice can lead to deeper community connection and novel approaches to media literacy education.

Fostering a more informed public through media literacy education and intergenerational learning in WA 

VIDEO |  APRIL 2025

At the Center for an Informed Public, we’re proud of our efforts to support the development of information literacy resources and educational programming, including intergenerational learning events. In a video, learn more about Leveling Up Seniors, an educational event where Sedro-Woolley High School students taught senior citizens in Skagit County some of the media literacy lessons they’re learning in the classroom. Then the seniors shared some life lessons and skills of their own with the high schoolers.    

CIP’s Carl Bergstrom and Jevin West introduce new ‘Modern-Day Oracles or Bullshit Machines?’ AI course 

02.05.2025

EDUCATION | The humanities course about how to learn, work and thrive in a world increasingly dominated by artificial intelligence was designed for students with and without a technical background. The entire course is free, available online and built around 18 lessons, each which take 5-10 minutes.

RESEARCH

In this October 13, 2022 photo, a voter drops a completed ballot into a mailbox in Lyon County, Nevada.

CIP publishes ‘Being Sensemakers: A Framework for University-Based Rapid Research of Elections, Crisis Events and Beyond’

12.15.2025

The Center for an Informed Public has published “Being Sensemakers: A Framework for University-Based Rapid Research of Elections, Crisis Events and Beyond,” a report that documents the work of the CIP’s 2024 Election Rumor Research Project (ERRP), which pursued a kind of research that often runs counter to traditional academic norms and incentives: it moves fast, responds to urgent public information needs in real time, spans and integrates multiple disciplines and prioritizes public impact over publication in peer-reviewed journals. This work produces research at speed while still using peer-reviewed methodologies, providing valuable educational experiences for students and research when it is needed most. 

CIP researchers present 6 papers and workshop at 2025 CSCW conference in Norway

10.27.2025

At the 28th ACM SIGCHI Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing (CSCW), held October 18-22 in Bergen, Norway, researchers affiliated with the CIP facilitated one conference workshop and presented 6 papers, including one that received a Best Paper award. 

Kate Starbird presents a lecture on stage in a packed ballroom with a large screen to her left.

During 2025 University Faculty Lecture, CIP’s Kate Starbird discusses how influence and improvisation shape online conversations

02.24.2025

RESEARCH | At the 2025 University Faculty Lecture, CIP co-founder Kate Starbird discussed her work understanding how online rumors, misinformation and disinformation are created and shared in uncertain times — shining a light on the roles we and others play on social media and beyond.

CIP Updates

 

 

“It’s one of the most  important problems of our time that we as a society need to solve. This is not a left or right issue. This is an issue that transcends political boundaries. Everyone wants to get this right.”

— Jevin West, Co-Founder and Inaugural Director

 

WHAT WE DO

RESEARCH

We support cutting-edge research with a strong focus on research to practice, which spans disciplines from sociology to information science and law.

EDUCATION

We educate information consumers across the demographic landscape in order to make more informed decisions.

LAW & POLICY

We address information policy through generative analyses of the legal frameworks and the available levers for intervention.

ENGAGEMENT

We engage directly with the public in collaboration with our partners, libraries and community leaders.

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