A new statewide poll shows most K-12 students are using artificial intelligence, but parents are divided on its use in the classroom and want more education on safety and digital literacy.
“AI is here to stay and is no longer a digital concept,” the Massachusetts EdTrust report on the poll released Wednesday declared.
According to a MassINC Polling Group poll, 59% of parents say their child is already using AI for schoolwork, and older students are using it more.
However, many parents (37%) say their child’s school lacks an AI policy or is unsure whether it has one.
Steve Koczela, president of the MassINC Polling Group, said there are mixed opinions on whether student use of AI is positive or negative.
“There’s a lot of uncertainty. There are parents on both sides of this issue, and not even both sides, but many parents still don’t know what to make of this issue,” Kozera said.
The poll shows that one-third of parents have positive views about AI in K-12 education, while the remaining third have negative views or are unsure. When it comes to the impact of AI on learning, almost half (48%) believe AI will have a positive impact on student learning, while 42% expect a negative impact.
Attitudes vary by gender, age, income, and education, but the differences between races are less pronounced. For example, black men are more optimistic about leveraging AI than black women.
When we asked whether AI helped prepare students, we found similar results for Latino parents and Asian parents. About a third say they’re more prepared, about a third say they’re less prepared, and a third don’t know or think there will be no change.
Men tend to be more optimistic than women when it comes to AI, and parents of multilingual learners are also generally more positive.
The MassINC poll mirrors the results of a separate poll released Wednesday. The Association of American Universities has found widespread concern among university faculty that students are becoming too dependent on artificial intelligence.
“They’re concerned about students’ ability to stay focused,” said Lee Lane, who runs the Digital Research Center at Elon University in North Carolina and led a study of more than 1,000 professors. “They’re concerned that students will basically follow these models or submit their lives to these models.”
Raine said these concerns are at the heart of higher education’s mission, and said part of the problem is that there is still no clear consensus on when the use of AI constitutes cheating and when it is a legitimate learning tool.
A MassINC poll found that most K-12 parents believe digital literacy should be a graduation requirement.
Keri Rodriguez, founding president of the National Parent Association, was on a panel discussing today’s poll results. Rodriguez has five children and is a member of the Teach AI steering committee.
She described the general attitude towards technology as: “Excitement, nervousness, a little bit of confusion about AI, definitely seeing this as an opportunity and wanting to prepare our kids for what the future of work and the economy will look like. ”
Parents also disagree on how AI should be used in the classroom. More than 70% said they were concerned about biased assessment of student performance, as well as threats to student data privacy and unequal access to tools that give some students an unfair advantage.
Chelsea Schools Superintendent Dr. Almi G. Abeyta said educators need professional development and should set aside time to take courses through the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
Abeyta said 87% of the district’s students are Latino and 57% are multilingual learners. She said there is a need to extend the learning process to the classroom.
““I don’t want my students to be left behind,” Abeyta said. “It’s…a question of equity for me. And I want my kids to have access too.”
Rodriguez stressed that schools need guardrails and need to get parental consent before exposing students to these new technologies.
“Doing this without parental consent and without parental knowledge really puts you at risk at this point, because you have a duty to care for the children who are exposed to these technologies in the classroom,” she said.
The poll revealed that the majority of parents believe that the use of AI sometimes amounts to cheating.
Andrea Cote, MA DESE’s assistant director of EdTech, said the state has formed a task force to find ways to help schools and districts teach about AI. This includes AI resources, professional development, and policy support.
“Our vision for education cannot be separated from the consideration of AI. AI is not a separate endeavor,” Cote said. “This spans instruction and assessment, administration and communication. It will change how students engage with content, how teachers design learning, and how systems leverage AI to make decisions.”
This latest statewide parent survey is the 12th in a series launched at the beginning of the pandemic to explore how AI is reshaping learning, work, and communication, and the opportunities and challenges facing students and schools. Last year, more than 1,300 Massachusetts parents with children in grades kindergarten through high school were surveyed over a three-week period from October 21st to November 12th.
