BACK TO SCHOOL, NOW WITH A.I.

This year is shaping up to be a global experiment in education: Can students embrace tech innovation without losing critical thinking skills?

We’ve written about how A.I. threatens jobs. About how it’s fomenting a political backlash. And, most recently, about how some in Silicon Valley now put the risk of a “total A.I. takeover” at more than 50 percent.

As a parent, one of the scariest things about A.I. is how pervasive it has already become in my children’s lives. Kids are not only using A.I. to answer questions. They’re using it to identify which questions to ask. (Although I was intrigued to hear from friends in New York that their teenagers were boycotting A.I. altogether.)

Today my colleague Natasha Singer, who has just published a book about how Big Tech is reshaping education, writes about Silicon Valley’s push to get A.I. into classrooms around the world — and why this year might be a crucial one.

The mass A.I. experiment in schools
by Natasha Singer

Children in much of the world are heading back to class right now, and it’s shaping up to be a school year like no other.

I’ve spent much of the past year reporting on how Google, Microsoft, OpenAI and Anthropic are racing to spread their A.I. chatbots in schools and universities.

This year alone, OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, signed A.I. education deals with Greece, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Slovakia and Trinidad & Tobago. Microsoft said it has helped “upskill” more than 160,000 educators in Thailand on A.I.

Anthropic says educators in more than 60 countries are learning to use its Claude chatbot. And Google turned on its Gemini chatbot in Google Classroom, an app used by tens of millions of students and teachers, in certain schools.

Many tech executives and billionaires say chatbots are poised to revolutionize education.

The industry’s pitch is that A.I. products will make teachers more efficient, engage children, automatically customize their learning and equip students with crucial career skills. In some schools, students are already using A.I. to help explain math and science concepts, build online games, and analyze data sets.

So far, however, there is little rigorous, peer-reviewed evidence to suggest that A.I. chatbots significantly improve students’ educational results. In fact, a number of recent studies show the technology can hinder critical thinking and reading comprehension.

And so unleashing unproven chatbots in schools amounts to a mass experiment, with the future of education at stake. Will A.I. become an effective tool for learning, or a classroom crutch?

The industry push for A.I. in schools pits Silicon Valley’s might against some local politicians and concerned parents’ groups — with many teachers and students caught in the middle.

- Author: Katrin Bennhold, The New York Times

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