Note of the editors: This is part of a regular series of articles written by Brunswick High School students who are interested in journalism. These students will treat problems in their school and the local community, with guidance by a teacher and editor at the Times Record.
In the new school year, Brunswick High School tries to understand the educational applications of artificial intelligence (AI) and at the same time control its use.
New rules from the Brunswick School department, released in the summer, tried to clarify the position of the district on AI.
“We want to ensure that we provide clarity about what you can and cannot use for,” said director Troy Henninger.
The rules strictly relate to generative artificial intelligence (GAI), technology that can produce original content (such as images, text, audio and other media) based on patterns and data on which the technology is trained.
There are two areas of guidance for use of AI at school that fall under the new rules – one for teachers and one for students. Educational possibilities are numerous for the teachers. Kaitlyn Ostrov, who teaches earth and space science, said that if she finds an article written above the reading level of her students, she can use AI to simplify the language and cook in a way in a way that students can better understand.
“If I have multilingual students, I can translate it into their mother tongue, which is really fun, because they can also get the information, so I feel it makes things bilder,” Ostrov said. “And if I explain something about students and the way I just explain, and they don’t understand, I can help me explain it in a different way.”
The new rules require that teachers get permission from their supervisor before they use new AI tools. Teachers must also recognize the limits of AI, verify the facts and evaluate the ethics before the information is used in their education.
Henninger said he and the Brunswick High Faculty are trying to ensure that the school uses the technology in a responsible manner in the coming year. During the professional development, a period in which Henninger says that teachers will “have a year to work with their colleagues and explore a subject of their choice”, a group of teachers will sign up to explore the area of AI and how their use in the classroom can be managed.
However, if AI is useful for teachers, this can be both harmful and valuable to students. In a recent opinion piece published in the Atlantic Ocean, in New York City High Schooler Ashanty Rosario, AI’s ‘demolition’ of their education complained, stating unbridled cheating among peers who destroy critical skills, such as the ability to function under pressure. High students, Rosario said, just lean on AI to bypass pressure or deadlines. ” Because of this negative impact on the completion of the work of students, the new rules of Brunswick School Department are based on the position that AI cannot be used as a replacement for students learning.
Henninger said the new rules require that student computers block sites with GAI options, such as Chatgpt. AI detectors are also present in the Google classrooms of many teachers. Some English teachers use Turnitin.com, which at the same time evaluates assignments for plagiarism and AI content. Cameron Coffey, a new science teacher in Brunswick, said that his students “are not allowed to use (AI) on school assignments, unless I explicitly approve them.”
Ana Wiley, a teacher from the World Studies, said she should do their work again of her students, “if someone uses AI for work with language that they clearly don’t know.”
Although there is a lot of harmful use of the technology, many students simply use it to try to increase their efficiency.
“I don’t use it for school work, I usually use it for study guides, note sheets and develop research – a lot of things that I can do alone, but I see things that are just brainless and not really benefit from my education,” said Ryan McPherson, a senior.
“It is used in all areas of science, technology and health care, and I think that if we do not teach students how to use it responsible and ethically, we will do them a bad service because we do not prepare them for the world they are going to enter when they leave high school,” Ostrov said.
Jonathan Bisson is a student journalist at Brunswick High School.
