Simplified: The Sioux Falls School District is starting to explore how teachers are using artificial intelligence (AI) in the classroom, and administrators are drafting a document to offer guidance on if – and how – students should be allowed to use AI in their schoolwork.

Why it matters

  • Artificial intelligence is becoming more and more prominent across industries. It only took five days for AI chatbot Chat GPT to reach one million users after it launched in late 2022.
  • Assistant Superintendent Kirk Zeeck told school board members this week that many teachers in the district say they're already using AI in some way, according to survey results taken last spring. Though about half of teachers say they aren't using it at all.
  • It's also important for students to understand the limitations of AI, said Jefferson High School English teacher Michele Wheeler. Wheeler said she had her students draft a short story using AI's help – with characters and settings written by the students.
    • During the exercise, students became frustrated when they realized how similar each of their AI-generated stories were.
"AI can create, but it is not creative," Wheeler said.

What's the AI policy in Sioux Falls schools?

There really isn't one, from an official standpoint. But the district has drafted a five-page document to give some guidance to teachers, including tools to let students know when it's OK to use AI on their assignments, and when it's not OK.

The goal is to strike some balance between fostering innovation in education while also keeping ethical principles like fairness, transparency and accountability in mind.

Some of the underlying principles are:

  • Ensuring all students have equitable access to AI,
  • Maintaining human oversight and clearly communicating what's OK to use AI for and what's not,
  • Adhering to strict data protection standards, and,
  • Ongoing monitoring and evaluation to "mitigate bias, prevent harm and assess educational value."

Moving forward, the idea is that the district will provide professional development for staff and empower teachers and students to use AI ethically.

  • That means teaching students how to use AI as well as teaching them to evaluate the AI-generated material.
"It's a tool," school board member Nan Kelly said. "It does not replace teacher and student interactions."

What happens next?

The district has a work group focused on AI, and they'll continue to work on the draft report until it ultimately goes before the school board for formal approval.