Louisiana Department of Education, Board of Regents Studying AI

(TNS) — As artificial intelligence starts to show up in classrooms across the country, Louisiana policymakers are considering how schools can make the most of the technology while avoiding its potential pitfalls.

The state Department of Education created a new AI task force this year to get ahead of the curve by developing policy recommendations for the state’s K-12 school systems. The group met Wednesday to discuss safeguards for AI education and how best to provide training and support to educators and students.

Also Wednesday, the state Board of Regents voted to create its own committee to study the use of AI in higher education.

Louisiana is among the first wave of states looking to offer schools guidance on how to harness the power of artificial intelligence, which some educators already use for tutoring, lesson planning and other classroom tasks. But many educators and experts also are concerned about the misuse of AI, including plagiarism and generating misinformation.

As of March, five other states had issued guidance and several others were in the process of developing recommendations, according to the Center on Reinventing Public Education.

Jagriti Agrawal, co-founder of Kira, a tech startup that develops STEM learning materials, said teachers have strong feelings about artificial intelligence — but what they really need now is guidance.

“Teachers’ reactions about AI right now are one extreme or the other,” said Agrawal, who is part of Louisiana’s new AI task force. “It’s either, ‘This technology will take over my job,’ or it’s, ‘Oh my God, it’s magic.'”

But the reality is not so extreme, Agrawal added. “It’s a tool just like any other.”

Louisiana has already embraced AI tutoring systems to mitigate learning losses caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, despite concern from experts who caution the research on computer-based tutoring is still inconclusive. The state education department selected an AI-powered computer program called Amira as one of several options schools can choose from to expand tutoring for students; about 360 Louisiana schools currently use it.

“We know that learning loss and gaps in student instruction exist, and we know the way to remedy that is very explicit instruction on exactly what the student needs,” said Jenna Chiasson, the state education department’s deputy superintendent of teaching and learning. “AI tutoring, from what we’ve seen so far, does exactly that. It’s able to really anticipate what the student needs.”

Many students already are experimenting with artificial intelligence. About one in five teenagers who have heard of ChatGPT, AI-powered software that can answer questions and generate text, said they have used it to help with homework, according to a Pew Research Center survey last fall.

Some teachers have also embraced AI, including as a way to help multilingual learners and students with disabilities. Yet many remain wary of its risks. According to a 2023 report by the U.S. Department of Education, educators recognize that the technology can produce output that is inappropriate or wrong, amplify biases and make it easier for students to pass off AI-generated work as their own.

Adam DiBenedetto, director of innovation at the Louisiana Department of Education, said the task force is seeking to mitigate such drawbacks through clear policies.

The most important thing is “student privacy and cyber security,” he said. “We want to make sure that the guidance is thorough and comprehensive enough to make sure that we take all of that into consideration.”

Some Louisiana schools have also begun to explore ways to use the technology outside of the classroom. A few school systems have bought ZeroEyes, a gun detection software that analyzes images from security feeds and sends alerts to authorities if a firearm is detected.

In West Baton Rouge, which implemented the technology a few years ago, Superintendent Chandler Smith said previously that the software detected two possible weapons during his first months on the job. One turned out to be a toy gun, and the other was a sheriff deputy’s firearm.

However, some digital rights advocates worry about the technology’s unintended consequences, arguing that programs like ZeroEyes can be rendered less effective through false negatives and algorithmic biases, both of which can put civilians at risk.

Louisiana’s colleges and universities are also preparing for an AI future.

At a Wednesday meeting for the Louisiana Board of Regents, during which the board voted to create its own committee to advise them on AI-related issues, Tristan Denley, deputy commissioner for academic affairs, said some institutions have formed task forces of their own to craft policies relating to the ethical use of AI, plagiarism and academic dishonesty.

Denley noted that some universities have already integrated the technology into computer science and programming courses or use it as a coding assistant, a prompt creator or instructional tool.

“We definitely see the profound and pervasive influence AI is going to have on every aspect of our lives,” said chair Gary Solomon Jr.

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