Jim Steyer | |
|---|---|
 Steyer in 2018 | |
| Born | James Pearson Steyer 1956 (age 68–69) New York City, U.S. |
| Occupation(s) | Civil rights attorney, professor and author |
| Years active | 1988–present |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse | Liz Butler Steyer[1] |
| Children | 4[1] |
| Family | Tom Steyer (brother)[2] |
James Pearson Steyer (/ˈstaɪ.ər/;[3] born 1956) is an American civil rights attorney, professor, and author. He foundedCommon Sense Media, an organization that "provides education and advocacy to families to promote safe technology and media for children."[4][5][6][7][8]
Steyer was born in New York City in 1956. His mother, Marnie (née Fahr), was a remedial reading teacher at the Brooklyn House of Detention, and his father, Roy Henry Steyer, was a partner in the New York law firm ofSullivan & Cromwell.[9][10] His father wasJewish[11] and his motherEpiscopalian.[2][12] He has two brothers: Hume Steyer andTom Steyer.[2] Steyer was highly influenced by his mother, who would sometimes bring him to class as her teaching assistant. In an article in theLos Angeles Times, Steyer's college friend, Mike Tollin, said "[Jim's] whole focus on kids comes from his close relationship with his mother…She was the kind of woman who would sit you down, ask you how things were, and you felt like you needed to tell her the truth."[13]
Steyer graduated early fromPhillips Exeter Academy inNew Hampshire and worked with his mother teaching remedial reading at apublic school inHarlem.[14] Steyer later graduatedPhi Beta Kappa fromStanford University where he was awarded the Lindsey Peters Award for Outstanding Work in American Government.[15] After two years of community development work in Asia, he attended Stanford Law School and graduated in 1983. During law school, Steyer was part of a group that founded theEast Palo Alto Community Law Project, a non-profitlegal services center for low-income families in East Palo Alto, California.[16] After Stanford, he became a law clerk for Justice Allen Broussard of theCalifornia Supreme Court. He then served as a civil rights attorney for theNAACP Legal Defense Fund. There, he helped spearhead the Poverty and Justice Program, focused on developing national legal and legislative strategies on behalf of disadvantaged African Americans.[17]
Steyer has been teaching courses as an adjunct professor atStanford University in political science, education,civil rights andcivil liberties for 35 years.[18][19] He has also authored three books:The Other Parent: The Inside Story of the Media's Effect on our Children in 2002,[20] which focuses on the effects certain media and government regulators have on children,Talking Back to Facebook: The Common Sense Guide to Raising Kids in the Digital Age in 2012,[21][22] andWhich Side of History: How Technology Is Reshaping Democracy & Our Lives in 2021.[23] His former students include New Jersey SenatorCory Booker, former National Security AdviserSusan Rice, andChelsea Clinton, who he raved was such a "star student" that he hired her as a teaching assistant and research aide.[24]
Steyer founded his first child advocacy venture, Children Now, in 1988. Children Now was one of the mainlobbying groups that fought for the three-hour-a-week educational children's programmingquota which eventually became law. The group also became well known for publishing a "report card" on California's children. This report card helped to shed light on important statistics. One of the red flags the report card raised was that one-fifth of California children lacked health insurance and only half were immunized.[25]
Shortly after starting Children Now, Steyer noticed a serious need for high-quality educational TV programs for kids. In response he started JP Kids in 1996, a for-profit company that produced such shows asThe Famous Jett Jackson, which aired on theDisney Channel. Steyer served as the company's Chairman and CEO.[13] Under Steyer's guidance, the company used various platforms to broadcast more educational and entertaining content. JP Kids also provided an online outlet for teens to share opinions, explore alternative points of views and discuss political and environmental topics.[26][15]
Steyer was awarded Stanford's highest teaching honor, the Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching, which is awarded annually to Stanford faculty, staff and teaching assistants, in 2010. Stanford students also voted for him to be Class Day speaker during Stanford's graduation exercises.[27] In 2011, theNew York Times reported that Steyer was helping build the Center for the Next Generation, anonprofit that aims to influencepublic policy debates focused on national children's andenergy issues.[15]
WhenGoogle announced in January 2012 that it would be compiling data about users from across its many sites, Steyer was quoted as saying that "Even if the company believes that tracking users across all platforms improves their services, consumers should still have the option to opt out — especially the kids and teens who are avid users ofYouTube,Gmail andGoogle Search.[28] In 2012, the Department of Education and theF.C.C. recruited Steyer as the chairman of the Leading Education by Advancing Digital (LEAD) Commission, which enhances digital devices and curriculums in schools.[19][29] Steyer was also a partner withHillary Clinton on the Too Small to Fail initiative.[30]
In June 2016, Steyer was included on Tech & Learning's 2016 List of the Most Influential People in Edtech.[31] That same year, Steyer launched the Common Sense Kids campaign through Common Sense Media creating "a mass army for kids" by focusing on children's issues in the political field.[32][19]
Steyer currently leads a Stanford course lecture, featuring guest speakers such asCondoleezza Rice,Thomas Friedman,Jim Mattis,Nicholas Kristof, andReid Hoffman.[33]
Steyer launched the Future of Tech Commission with formerMassachusetts GovernorDeval Patrick and formerEducation SecretaryMargaret Spellings as co-chairs, in April 2021. The commission will compile solutions for a comprehensive tech policy agenda, underPresident Biden and The United States Congress, on topics such as privacy, antitrust, digital equity, content moderation and platform accountability.[34]
Founded in 2003, Steyer's nonprofit organization,Common Sense Media,[19][35] focuses on the effects that media and technology have on young users. Steyer describes the group as "nutritional labeling of media". The leading national media advocacy group is financed by donations from foundations and individuals and fees from media partners. Common Sense Media distributes its content to more than 100 million US homes via partnerships withComcast, Time Warner Cable, DIRECTV,NBC Universal,Netflix,Best Buy,Google, Yahoo!,AOL,Huffington Post, Fandango,Trend Micro, Verizon Foundation,Nickelodeon, and more.[36]
Steyer's advocacy has reached tens of millions of parents a month in articles, reviews and advice columns. Common Sense Media helps parents and their children to identify content that could be harmful to a younger audience.[37] During a U.S. House of Representatives hearing in December 2021, Steyer claimed that Common Sense Media had 1.2 million registered teacher members. Their education programs focus on digital literacy and citizenship for students & parents and are in use in more than 90,000 schools across the U.S.[38] Common Sense Media played a major role in the passage of the 2005California law restricting the sale of violent video games,[15] but was struck down by the Supreme Court.
In March 2012 thefeature length documentaryBully was released intoAMC Theatres with a "Pause 13+" rating designated by Common Sense Media. The film had previously been rated R by theMPAA. Under the new rating, AMC theaters allowed entrance to viewers under 17 provided they had a signed permission slip.[39]
In 2023, Steyer was a speaker atSXSW, representing Common Sense Media in the panel discussionHow Teens Really Feel About Social Media.[40] He was also a featured speaker at the 2023Aspen Ideas Festival.[41]
In January 2024, the first annualCommon Sense Summit on America’s Kids and Families was held, featuring speakers such asVivek Murthy,Hillary Clinton, andSam Altman.[42][43]
In 2014, Steyer supported California's "Eraser Bill", which lets California children under 18 remove their postings from social media websites.[44] The same year, Steyer called the passage of California Senate Bill 1177 "a big win for kids".[45] The bill prohibits the sale and disclosure of schools' online student data. The bill also forbids targeted ads based on school information and the creation of student profiles when not used for education purposes.[46]
In 2016, Steyer led Common Sense to launch Common Sense Legislative Ratings in an effort to publicize legislative bills that would help children and expose bills that could harm them.[47] Common Sense Media supported the U.S. Department of Commerce's creation of an "online privacy policy", which would include a "Privacy Bill of Rights" and would make clear which types of personal information companies are allowed to keep on clients.[48]
Steyer has also called for updates to theChildren's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), calling the time of the act's creation "the stone age of digital media" and pointing out the lack at the time of platforms such as Google, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.[49]
In 2018 Steyer wrote in favor of sweeping privacy legislation, similar to the European Union's GDPR (2018), writing in the San Francisco Chronicle: "California families also deserve the right to informed consent when it comes to their personal information."[50]
Common Sense and Steyer sponsored the California Consumer Privacy Act of 2018 which guarantees new data privacy rights for the state's consumers, with extra protections for kids under 16. The legislation, AB 375, took effect in 2020.[51] They also endorsed the 2020 California Proposition 24, the Consumer Personal Law and Agency Initiative.[52]
Also in 2018 Steyer joined with former Google employee Tristan Harris and Facebook investor Roger McNamee on the "Truth About Tech" campaign.[53]
In 2018, Steyer was included in an article byThe Wall Street Journal called "The New Tech Avengers", "an unlikely triumvirate of Silicon Valley insiders [...] holding the tech industry accountable on privacy and addiction."[54]
On 25 September 2020, Steyer was named as one of the 25 members of the"Real Facebook Oversight Board", an independent monitoring group overFacebook.[55]
Steyer is the author ofThe Other Parent: The Inside Story of the Media's Effect on Our Children. According toStanford Magazine, the book "paints a frightening picture of greedy media companies, indifferent government regulators and parents too overwhelmed to pay attention."[27] He has served on numerous non-profit boards including Children Now, the National Parenting Association[56] and the San Francisco Free Clinic.[57]
In 2012, Steyer releasedTalking Back to Facebook, a book that deals with the presence of digital media in the lives of children.[58][59] The book, with a foreword written byChelsea Clinton, advocates for larger parental involvement in children's technological activities.Talking Back to Facebook outlines strategies for safeguarding against a potentially dangerous digital world. During a May 2012 segment ofNPR'sFresh Air withTerry Gross, Steyer noted that, "In a world where everything's photographed, where kids are constantly snapping photos on their cellphones and where youthful indiscretion is exactly the same as it's always been, the consequences can be much greater".[60]
In 2020, Steyer authoredWhich Side of History: How Technology is Reshaping Democracy and Our Lives.Bruce Reed,Deputy Chief of Staff to President Joe Biden, co-wrote a chapter pushing for reforms of the Communications Decency Act.[23]Sacha Baron Cohen andMichael Bloomberg were also contributors.[61]
Steyer lives in theBay Area with his wife, Liz (née Butler), and their four children.[1] His wife is the Director of theCalifornia Institute on Law, Neuroscience and Education, an interdisciplinary research and policy institute funded by the state of California.[62] Prior to joining the CA Institute, she led the Athletic Scholars Advancement Program as well as Legal Services for Children.[63][64] She also worked with the Glide Foundation to redesign their services for women and families.[65]
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)