Google to shut off search for schools that opt-out of AI

Google announced Tuesday morning that it would switch off AI products by default for students in schools that use the technology giant’s education software. But those schools that forgo its AI services would also be cut off from Google Search. The move comes after mounting criticism from advocacy groups and senators about the spread of Google’s AI services available in classrooms. Until Tuesday, its AI products — branded under the Gemini moniker — were automatically activated for schools using Google Classroom. Google said Tuesday’s move would also cut off students’ access to Google Search if schools do not enable Gemini, given AI’s growing integration in the company’s search products. Chris Phillips, Google’s vice president and general manager of education, stated in a blog post announcing the change that access to Gemini, Gemini Notebook, Gemini in Classroom and Google Search “will be entirely off for K-12 student accounts until school administrators explicitly turn them on.” “We believe schools should have control over AI in their classrooms and in providing administrators with controls to help them manage their approach,” Phillips wrote. Some education and technology advocates immediately slammed the decision, painting the move as a punishment for schools that don’t use Google’s AI. “It is unfortunate that Google has prioritized its business interests over the education of our children,” said Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, a national educators union. “Instead of working with teachers and parents to uphold privacy and ensure their tools are safe and useful, it throws the baby out with the bathwater and bans access to the tools altogether,” she told NBC News in written comments. Josh Golin, executive director of advocacy group Fairplay, said in a statement that Google is attempting “to strong-arm schools into using its AI products.” “Schools should use this opportunity to help students find more privacy-protective alternatives for search, as well as ways to do more substantive research beyond search and click,” Golin said. FOR SUBSCRIBERSDOJ is deploying a record number of monitors on Election Day FOR SUBSCRIBERSHow NBC News has prepared to cover election night FOR SUBSCRIBERSWelcome to the gas price election FOR SUBSCRIBERSThe fight for young men comes to Michigan FOR SUBSCRIBERSTrump holds final rally of a 28-stop midterm blitz FOR SUBSCRIBERSDOJ is deploying a record number of monitors on Election Day FOR SUBSCRIBERSHow NBC News has prepared to cover election night FOR SUBSCRIBERSWelcome to the gas price election FOR SUBSCRIBERSThe fight for young men comes to Michigan FOR SUBSCRIBERSTrump holds final rally of a 28-stop midterm blitz Earlier this year, Google turned on Gemini in its Classroom app, allowing children — regardless of age — to access AI products unless districts disabled it. Parent advocacy groups and experts on the use of technology in schools denounced Google for providing AI products to children — raising concern that students would outsource their work to AI systems on school devices — and lobbied school districts to disable Gemini products. In an open letter from early October, thirteen leading parent advocacy organizations — including the Digital Childhood Institute and Schools Beyond Screens — called on school districts to turn off access to Gemini and YouTube, which is also owned by Google. Google has established a dominant role in education technology over the past 15 years. The vast majority of Chromebook laptops are purchased by school districts to provide to students. Nearly two-thirds of assignments use a Google product, according to a 2023 report by the firm Schoolytics. This year, the company began offering multi-day AI trainings for educators, featuring sessions that focused on how they could mitigate pushback by teachers who don’t want to use AI. Research on AI in educational settings has not established a long-term benefit for students. There are no high-quality causal studies into student use of AI, according to the SCALE Initiative at the Stanford Graduate School of Education. Researchers have also warned that many of the studies conducted so far on AI in education didn’t measure whether it boosted learning, and often did not test whether AI-assisted learning was superior to other teaching methods. In Tuesday’s blog post, Google said that for schools that enable the company’s AI products, they will now detect when a student is trying to use them just to get an answer on an assignment. A redesigned version of Google Search will instead walk students through the topic or problem and work through the concepts, without going directly to the answer, the company said.