How are AI use and policy changing in schools? New VCU research identifies key gaps

By Madeline Reinsel

Teachers and students are already using artificial intelligence to create lesson plans and complete homework, but many Virginia school districts don't have AI policies. That leaves educators to make their own decisions about how AI tools - especially large language models like ChatGPT and Claude - are used in their classrooms.

On July 1, a new state law directed the Virginia Department of Education to create guidelines around AI use in public schools, and it will eventually require local school boards to create their own AI use policies. Two new reports from Virginia Commonwealth University's Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium within the School of Education examine current AI use in schools from prekindergarten through high school nationwide, assess AI use policies in Virginia school districts and provide recommendations for districts writing their own AI guidelines.

"It's something that school systems are still trying to wrap their heads around," said David Naff, Ph.D., one of the report's lead authors and an associate professor of research, assessment and evaluation in the School of Education, as well as the director of MERC. "There's a lot of variability right now, and there could be some benefit from more consistent and central guidance."

The researchers found that there is a critical need for AI-related training for teachers nationwide, as well as a need to teach students how to use AI effectively and ethically. Additionally, six of the 10 Virginia school districts included in the state-focused report had no policies explicitly referencing AI, while the remaining four had only some AI-related language in their guidebooks.

But even when school districts did have some AI regulations, the guidance was often nonspecific. For examples, only two of 10 school districts had policies around AI use by teachers, and most had not altered their data privacy systems to protect against AI use of student records.

"In some cases, schools have started to adopt policies that would, in certain domains, regulate how AI is integrated into the educational system," said Jesse Senechal, Ph.D., an assistant professor of foundations of education in the School of Education and the executive director of the Institute for Collaborative Research and Evaluation, as well as one of the report's lead authors. "The main takeaway is it has been a somewhat slow and disjointed process."

VCU News spoke with Naff and Senechal for more insights.

How are teachers and students around the country currently using AI?

Naff: The percentage of teachers nationwide who report using AI in their work has increased sharply in recent years, often in support of lesson planning or differentiating instructional materials for students with disabilities and multilingual learners. Student use has also increased in recent years, and students often report using it for homework support or getting feedback on their writing.

What do AI policies currently look like in schools throughout Virginia?

Senechal: Right now, it's a patchwork. Where policy exists, it tends to cluster around a few areas, including student use and academic integrity. In these cases, existing policies, like plagiarism rules or acceptable-use agreements, serve as a foundation. The places with almost no coverage are staff use and training. There's no old technology policy that tells a teacher what they're allowed to do with AI the way an acceptable-use policy tells a student. What we found is that AI governance hasn't caught up to how fast the tools have shown up in classrooms and schools.

"AI governance hasn't caught up to how fast the tools have shown up in classrooms and schools."

What are some of the concerns around student and teacher AI use?

Naff: Research nationwide shows that developing AI literacy for both students and teachers is a pressing challenge facing schools and school systems. In order for AI to be effectively and ethically used in the classroom, it is imperative to have a clear understanding of both its advantages and limitations, and to have the capacity to critically analyze its outputs. Additionally, because the integration of AI into PK-12 education is fairly recent (at least at this scale), research suggests that there is a need for clearer guidelines at the state, district and school levels about how to appropriately use it.

How could the new law shift how students and teachers are using AI in Virginia's schools?

Senechal: The law won't have an immediate impact on how students and teachers are using AI. What it does is create a compliance requirement that wasn't there before. Every division now has to adopt a policy aligned with state guidance, whereas before, whether a division had one at all was purely a local call. So, the shift isn't immediate. Once the Virginia Department of Education's guidance comes out and divisions start aligning to it, I'd expect the patchwork we documented to narrow.

What are some important points for schools to consider when developing AI guidelines?

Naff: AI presents the opportunity to help teachers reduce their workload by saving time in lesson planning, while personalizing instruction for individual students in their classroom. However, while AI can potentially help to enhance teaching and learning in this way, it is still important for there to be human oversight by expert teachers over AI-generated outputs. Additionally, it is important to recognize that students and teachers currently have complex feelings about the use of AI in education, often recognizing its potential benefits while expressing concerns about it undermining critical thinking, perpetuating bias or facilitating plagiarism.

How does Virginia's K-12 AI policy compare with other states?

Senechal: Nationally, state-level AI policy has moved fast. As of last year, 28 states had published some kind of guidance on AI in schools, up from just two states in 2023. But guidance and a compliance mandate are different things. A lot of states have issued recommendations without requiring anything of local districts. Virginia's law puts us in a smaller group of states that have gone further, creating an actual requirement that school boards adopt policy in line with state guidance.