High school students now have their own Gemini AI accounts
High school students now have their own Gemini AI accounts
High school students now have their own Gemini AI accounts
Schoolteachers have struggled for years with the challenge of addressing artificial intelligence in the classroom.
Instead of banning it, Howard County Public Schools is embracing AI — even giving high school students their own Gemini AI accounts.
Danielle Dunn, the media relations specialist at Hammond High School, said the accounts have guardrails to block students from asking it to do all their work for them. For example, Dunn said AI will not write a paper for the students, but it will help guide them on how to structure an assignment.
“If we don’t teach kids how to use it, they’re going to learn it on their own and not learn well,” Dunn told WBAL-TV 11 News.
“I grew up a lot around tech. I’ve been using AI since before it was introduced. I was one of the beta testers for OpenAI,” said Sheku Sheriff, a junior at Hammond High School.
The accounts also have safety guardrails.
“If you try to solicit some information about self-harm or anything with mental health, it will give you the crisis hotline,” Dunn told WBAL-TV 11 News.
While all Howard County high school students have accounts, they still need permission from their teachers to use it on an assignment.
The curriculum starts in the second grade, and elementary school lessons focus on terms and understanding digital citizenship before the lessons get more in-depth in middle school.
Stephanie Allen, an instructional technology teacher at Bryant Woods Elementary School, told WBAL-TV 11 News that explaining these concepts at a young age will help students have a strong foundation when they’re older.
“If you lay the foundation early with discipline and things of that nature, it’s instilled in them from a very early age,” Allen told WBAL-TV 11 News. “As they grow, they take those norms and rules and that responsibility with them.”
Jonathan Evans, a teacher at Thomas Viaduct Middle School, said the lessons teach “the difference between deep learning and machine learning.” Evans said it’s vital to teach students that AI can be wrong.
Evans told WBAL-TV 11 News that he works to explain AI is meant to be a tool and not to replace learning.
“We wanted to make sure that they are doing what they need to get to the end goal, and not just using AI as a vessel to skip over those steps,” Evans told WBAL-TV 11 News.
Students like Sheriff said they’re excited to see how AI technology evolves and how there’s something for everyone willing to learn how to use it.
“I think AI should be embraced more. I don’t think it should be something that’s seen as harmful. A lot of the older generation can benefit from the use of AI,” Sheriff told WBAL-TV 11 News.
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