Anne Arundel County school board weighs new policy that could allow AI tools in classrooms

ANNAPOLIS, Md — The Anne Arundel County school board is considering a policy that could allow artificial intelligence in its classrooms.

A new AI policy was introduced at Wednesday night's school board meeting. The policy would allow AI in schools across the county, but it establishes a central principle: AI should support people, not replace their judgment.

The policy focuses on human oversight, privacy, equity, appropriate student use, employee training and vetting AI tools before adoption.

Robin Lake is the director of the Center for Reinventing Public Education at Arizona State University. She says she believes the proposed policy from the school board includes a lot of thought about how AI can benefit schools.

She says she hopes the school board focuses on how AI can be a support tool and not take the place of classroom learning.

"Vetting the tools in itself is a challenge because a lot of the tools are pretty new and haven't had a lot of rigorous evaluation behind them and so its a lot to ask a school district to figure out if the tools are effective or not," Lake said.

"The piece of advice that I like to give schools and school districts is first of all have a really clear vision for teaching and learning what do you want it to be, what are you trying to achieve, what are your goals for academic outcomes and then think about how AI can be of service to those goals," Lake said.

At Wednesday night's meeting, some teachers expressed concern about adding AI in schools regardless of oversight and strict policies.

"Allowing students to use a tool that designed to mine data and keep users engaged just like social media would have a negative effect on students," one teacher said.

"And I think we have a responsibility as educators to encourage students to think creatively and think independently and we all know that the ability for students to use AI diminishes any and all of those skills," another teacher said.

Lake says she understands where teachers are coming from and hopes that if the school district decides to move forward and implement this policy, it ensures support not just for students, but teachers and staff as well.

"And so it does require a lot of support for teachers to help them figure out what is a good use of their time with these tools, why are they useful, what are the things to watch for in terms of students over-reliance and ethical behavior with them and making sure that students too and parents understand why these tools are being used and what guardrails are being put in place," Lake said.

Since the policy was first introduced at Wednesday night's meeting, the second read is scheduled for December 2 and the final adoption vote is scheduled for December 16.

After the meeting, the AI policy will be uploaded to the county's website, open to public comment for 30 days.

This story was initially reported by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.