Los Angeles Unified School District officials announced a moratorium on AI use at its first Generative AI Ad Hoc committee meeting Wednesday. LAUSD’s announcement coincides with New York City Public Schools, which also announced a ban on AI use among students who are in eighth grade or younger.
As a surprise to district board members, administrators implemented the moratorium as an effort to comply with LAUSD’s new policy to either ban or curtail screen time in the classroom, depending on the grade level. That policy, along with LAUSD’s early effort to ban cellphones in the classroom, comes as part of a larger trend to curb technology use in the classroom.
“Today’s announcements in LA and NYC prove that the people have the power to reclaim US public schools from corporate influence,” Lila Byock, founder of Schools Beyond Screens, a parent group that has been pushing for less technology in the classroom, said in a statement. “The health of our democracy demands that we fight to preserve the ability of young minds to think critically and independently about the forces shaping our world.”
This story was originally published by EdSource.