{"id":27232,"date":"2026-05-04T22:42:14","date_gmt":"2026-05-04T22:42:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/27232\/"},"modified":"2026-05-04T22:42:14","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T22:42:14","slug":"wa-school-districts-explore-ai-with-microsoft-grant","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/27232\/","title":{"rendered":"WA school districts explore AI with Microsoft grant"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>
\nEducation Lab<\/a> is a Seattle Times project that spotlights promising approaches to persistent challenges in public education. The Seattle Foundation serves as the fiscal sponsor for Education Lab, which is supported by grants from the Gates Foundation and Ballmer Group. Learn more about Ed Lab<\/a> and subscribe to our weekly newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Amid questions about artificial intelligence\u2019s role in K-12 schools, 10 Washington districts are diving into an 18-month Microsoft-funded program to work on AI initiatives.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The 615-student Manson district in Chelan County intends to explore a mandatory ninth grade AI literacy class, which it hopes to pilot this fall.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Seattle is planning to translate AI guidance to help teachers, students and families understand how and when they\u2019re allowed to use AI.<\/p>\n

And Issaquah is working on an AI agent for high schoolers who receive special education services to navigate their education plans in real time and ensure the legally mandated services are working.<\/p>\n

The $75,000-per-district grants, announced in February, are part of the Microsoft Elevate Washington initiative to expand AI access and related skills statewide. Districts can also get up to $25,000 to work with a Microsoft-certified consultant. The other grantees are Bellevue, Federal Way, Kennewick, Highline, Puyallup, Quincy and Walla Walla school districts.<\/p>\n

The grants come as tech companies \u2014 from Microsoft to OpenAI to Anthropic \u2014 offer their products to districts or partner with<\/a> educators.\u00a0<\/p>\n

AI boosters say the tools could reduce time educators spend on administrative tasks \u2014 from creating lesson plans to analyzing large data sets \u2014 and free up teachers to work with students. Teachers and students are already using AI regardless of district policies, and students will need to know how to use AI and do so ethically and responsibly in the workplace, proponents say.<\/p>\n

That push lands amid increased calls from parents and others to roll back technology \u2014 from cellphones to laptops \u2014 in schools over concerns about privacy and the effects on students\u2019 learning, critical thinking and well-being. They worry current AI tools are untested and unsafe for children, and the companies\u2019 rush to partner with districts are akin to customer-acquisition programs that build lifelong brand affinity, potentially at children\u2019s expense.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Still, students\u2019 use is increasing. A Pew Research Center<\/a> report in February found that 54% of students aged 13 to 17 used chatbots to assist with schoolwork and 57% to find information, more than twice as many who reported using ChatGPT for schoolwork in a 2024 survey.<\/a> Twelve percent said they\u2019d used chatbots for emotional support or advice.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, a RAND survey<\/a> released in March showed that students are also concerned about how AI may impact their ability to think critically, with 67% agreeing that it would harm their critical thinking skills as more students used AI for homework.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jolenta Coleman-Bush, Microsoft\u2019s director of education, workforce and AI skills, said the company was not dictating what schools should do with AI. But it\u2019s important educators understand the tools, as they are best-suited to determine appropriate use in schools, to help shape policy, and \u201cto prepare the next generation for an AI-enabled world,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s our intent: It\u2019s really to build up the capacity of educators,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

But Benjamin Riley, the founder of Cognitive Resonance,<\/a> which educates people on generative AI, said districts should resist the pressure and \u201cstop chasing technology hype.\u201d<\/p>\n

Riley thinks the tools are pernicious because they outsource thinking and impede the student-teacher relationship.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are tools of cognitive automation, and since the business of education is to build knowledge and improve cognition, these are really profoundly unhelpful tools by and large,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Riley pushed back on the argument \u201cthe future demands this.\u201d Not too long ago, the same people were saying everyone needs to learn how to code, he said.<\/p>\n

Schools are in a hard spot because they\u2019re under pressure to \u201cdo something,\u201d but it\u2019s still unclear what\u2019s good AI policy, professional development or best practice, said Justin Reich, an associate professor of digital media at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Districts, he said, should be upfront about their experimentation. They could run small, local experiments, gather data, evaluate and change accordingly, said Reich, who is also director of the Teaching Systems Lab.<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cStep one is humility, and to say, \u2018we do not know what to do \u2026,\u2019 \u201d he said. \u201cI think there are a lot of elite actors that are not doing a very good job with this humility.\u201d<\/p>\n

District officials in the Microsoft project who were interviewed said they don\u2019t feel like they\u2019re being pitched a product \u2014 some already use Copilot, or other products, like Google Gemini.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Meg O\u2019Conor, a Microsoft spokesperson, said the skepticism was fair, but the company\u2019s education work predates AI, and it\u2019s agnostic about the products the districts use.<\/p>\n

District officials said they applied for the Microsoft grant because they were already experimenting with AI \u2014 with policies, teacher professional development or student use. The grant provides access to expertise the districts might not otherwise have, and the cohort of diverse districts offers a chance to learn from peers, they said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been an equalizer,\u201d said Tina Brewer, director of professional learning and assessment in Kennewick, where some teachers have embraced AI while others remain skeptical.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Kennewick is considering adding more professional development for teachers and a chatbot for teachers to help strengthen and differentiate instruction.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody is trying to find their way through this \u2026 and we\u2019re all trying to support each other in making the right decisions, because we are all wanting to do the right things for students,\u201d Brewer said.<\/p>\n

Networking was also a big draw for Seattle, said Debra Knickerbocker, the district\u2019s digital learning manager.<\/p>\n

Seattle has been releasing AI guidance the last year and half, she said. Part of its project will address AI literacy and communicating to teachers and students the district\u2019s expectations for AI use, including in specific classes.<\/p>\n

She said the district wants to \u201chelp our students figure out when AI would make sense in our educational journey and when it might impact their critical thinking.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Manson started an AI class in its career-and-technical-education pathway last year, but Superintendent Tabatha Mires said educators found students were missing key digital skills, including how to assess answers for bias.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She said the district is exploring AI because it\u2019s aligned with Manson\u2019s goal to graduate students ready for a changing world.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we just bury our heads in the sand, I don\u2019t think we are doing a great job of ensuring that we are prepared for some of those dangers that we have heard about,\u201d Mires said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got to stay pretty well-educated about both the benefits and the possible harm that can come through use of AI with children.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Issaquah, officials are envisioning an AI agent that will enable students with disabilities to pull up the legal documents detailing how they will be educated and get real-time answers about those plans in language they can understand.<\/p>\n

The project grew from panels the district hosted last year with secondary students who receive special education services. Those students said it was burdensome to discuss their accommodations with every teacher they encountered, according to Sharine Carver, the district\u2019s executive director of special education.<\/p>\n

Carver acknowledged there are challenges, including ensuring student data \u2014 like medical information that may be included in those documents \u2014 is protected and won\u2019t be used for training AI models. The district plans to get student input on any product developed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Emily Cherkin, a teacher, SPS parent and ed-tech writer, is also concerned about student privacy. She understands why children need to learn about AI, but believes there are ways to teach students about risks without exposing them to potential harm.<\/p>\n

Both Cherkin and Riley signed a recent petition<\/a> for a five-year pause on generative AI in pre-K-12 schools nationwide.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly, the best thing you can do to prepare children for the world we live in is to give them the critical thinking and executive function and citizenship skills offline,\u201d she said. \u201cThose are the skills that are going to raise critical thinkers to go into the tech fields to know why and when and how to use these tools.\u201d<\/p>\n

Microsoft Philanthropies underwrites some Seattle Times journalism projects.<\/p>\n

Denisa R. Superville: 206-464-8216 or dsuperville@seattletimes.com<\/a>. Denisa R. Superville is an Education Lab reporter at The Seattle Times, where she writes about school districts as they emerge from the pandemic years. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Education Lab is a Seattle Times project that spotlights promising approaches to persistent challenges in public education. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27233,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[420,7829,18119,320,7828,13848],"class_list":{"0":"post-27232","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-microsoft","8":"tag-azure","9":"tag-azure-ai","10":"tag-boys-u0026amp-girls-club-ai-microsoft","11":"tag-microsoft","12":"tag-microsoft-ai","13":"tag-wpresize"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27232","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27232"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27232\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27232"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27232"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27232"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}