New York City Public Schools is banning artificial intelligence-powered learning tools for elementary and middle school students, nixing individual devices for younger children, and recommending strict age-based screen-time limits, Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced Sept. 2.
The policy—which Mamdani called the “most comprehensive of its kind”— will be in place for this school year, and the district will carefully assess its impact.
“We know the purpose of AI companies, whether they are making sports betting models, or an education tool, is to produce a profit,” Mamdani said in a press conference. “Here in our New York City public schools, our purpose is our students.”
The mayor, elected last year on promises to address affordability and protect consumers, framed the policy as one crafted with the interests of families in mind.
New Yorkers “deserve to know that their children’s data won’t be mined by big tech, and they deserve to know that their children’s growth won’t be compromised for a corporation’s bottom line,” he said.
The policy also bans the use of school-issued computing devices in pre-kindergarten through 2nd grade. It recommends screen-time limits of 30 minutes a day for students in grades 3-5, and 45 minutes a day for grades 6-8.
And it prohibits the use of so-called “companion chatbots"—which offer students mental health or emotional support—for all students.
There are some limited exceptions to the policy, including for students in special education and English learners who need AI or technology to access the curriculum.
High schoolers will be permitted to use AI tools in some circumstances, in part, so that they can become familiar with the technology.
“We need to prepare our older students carefully and deliberately for a world where AI is already a part of their daily life,” said Kamar Samuels, the district’s chancellor.
The nation’s largest school district has served as a bellwether for how districts around the country react to AI, a groundbreaking technology that is reshaping broad swaths of society and the economy.
The district initially blocked ChatGPT on school networks shortly after the large language model emerged in late 2022. Then it reversed course, even setting up an AI policy office, as many districts sought to figure out how to harness the technology for teaching and learning.
Now, as school districts and states across the country—including Los Angeles, second only to New York in district size—respond to a tidal wave of anti-technology backlash by restricting tech use and AI in schools, the district, under a new mayor and chancellor, has executed yet another about-face.
New York’s move feels like a “knee-jerk reaction” to AI fears, said Jean-Claude Brizard, the CEO of Digital Promise, a nonprofit that focuses on technology and equity. (Brizard spoke based upon his understanding of the policy, details of which are still emerging.)
“For many decades, New York City has been a beacon for education leadership around the world,” said Brizard, who served as a teacher, principal, and district leader in the Big Apple before heading up schools in Chicago and Rochester, N.Y.
AI can be harnessed thoughtfully to help students think critically and be creative, he said. But blocking kids from even trying out the technology before high school presents an equity issue.
“Kids of middle income, upper income parents are going to have access to technology. They’re going to learn how to use AI,” he said. “The poor kids in New York City will be the ones who will suffer [without a] sensible approach to leveraging technology.”
High schoolers will have limited access to AI tools in city schools
New York will be operating five pilot programs that allow high schoolers to use a limited array of AI tools that have been carefully vetted for privacy and safety and allow room for students’ critical thinking, officials said.
Those tools can be used in no more than five classes per school, for a limited number minutes or on a restricted number of assignments.
These include: Quill, a language arts learning program; Edia, a math tool; Brisk, a comprehensive AI tool for educators and students; Playlab, which helps students examine AI-created content, and Intel-AI-Ready Schools, which use AI to find solutions to community problems.
But generative AI components of roughly 38 other education technology tools will be turned off on school-issued devices. If AI elements cannot be disconnected, the district will nix the tool entirely, city officials said.
Products that will be affected by this decision include widely used ed-tech tools such as Amira Learning, an AI-powered literacy tool, and those developed by HMH, a well-known K-12 company, an official said during the press conference.
“We have a rigorous set of standards that we are going to apply for any educational tool, and we do not care how big that company is, how profitable it is, how long we have been working with them,” Mamdani said.
“They need to meet the same level of standards, and if they do not today, that doesn’t mean that we won’t work with them to get there. But it does mean that those standards have to be public.”
AI guidelines for teachers remain unchanged, Samuels said.
New York public schools issued guidance in March that instructs teachers to not use AI to determine a students’ grade. But the guidance permits educators to use AI—with caution—to plan lessons, write emails to caregivers, or analyze student data.
For some, the newly announced policy doesn’t go far enough to curtail the use of technology in schools.
Kelly Clancy, a New York City public school mom and the leader of Parents for AI Caution in Educational Spaces, a grassroots organization, was disappointed that screen-time limits don’t appear as if they will be strictly enforced.
“Unfortunately, the guidance, as we understand it, does not significantly change the material conditions of children in NYC schools,” she said in a statement. “Children after second grade will have no restrictions placed on their screen time—only easily ignored recommendations. Most troublingly, high schoolers will be enrolled in pilot AI programs and be guinea pigs for big tech before there are any kinds of frameworks or guardrails established.”
And others have concerns about the lack of details the school district is providing—such as which ed-tech programs will no longer be used or will have AI components dismantled.
“This is a political mess,” said Keri Rodrigues, the president of the National Parent Union. “Parents were promised a voice and got a policy handed to them after the fact.”
The strange political divisions on ed tech in schools
The district’s move is also a further window into the peculiar politics surrounding the use of AI in teaching and learning.
Mamdani, a longtime, highly visible member of the Democratic Socialists of America, appears to be in sync with Utah’s ruby red state legislature.
Utah passed a law earlier this year banning schools from using AI to grade student work or make high-stakes decisions about student learning, and setting substantial limits on screen time, particularly in early elementary grades.
More than a dozen states have considered similar legislation this past session, with seven states—both red and blue—ultimately enacting laws that address the use of school-issued devices and digital tools in K-12 classrooms, according to EdWeek Market Brief.
The odd politics are on display even within the Trump administration.
Kirsten Baesler, the assistant secretary for elementary and secondary education at the U.S. Department of Education, urged schools recently to focus on whether education technology tools offer “educational value” for students, as opposed to only considering how much time students spend on digital learning platforms each week.
President Donald Trump has been bullish on the use of artificial intelligence in schools. Last year, he signed an executive order calling for an infusion of AI throughout K-12 education, including training teachers on how to integrate the technology into their instruction and workflows.
And First Lady Melania Trump appeared with an AI-powered humanoid robot at a White House summit, where she touted the potential of an always-available and ever-patient—and as yet uninvented—humanoid educator named Plato to teach students classical studies.
But in May, Trump’s Office of the Surgeon General, part of the Department of Health and Human Services, recommended that schools limit students’ screen time to improve their focus and learning capabilities, as well as their physical and mental health.
