In this blog, we’ll explain what an AI policy is and what it should cover, why it matters, and provide some guidance on creating your own.
What is an AI policy and why is it important?
An AI policy is a set of rules, regulations, and guidelines that governs the use of AI in a school or business. It’s especially important in schools due to the risks associated with using AI such as data privacy concerns, student plagiarism, and academic misconduct. As AI is still a very new technology to schools, it’s critical you introduce a policy as soon as possible to control the adoption of new tools and use cases that could have negative impacts on your pupils and establishment.
What should your policy cover?
It should cover every AI use case and tool used in your school, as well as the following areas:
Using generative AI tools
Generative AI tools like ChatGPT are the most popular available among school pupils and staff. While they have great potential as learning tools and for streamlining school admin (i.e. writing letters and creating homework assignments), they can be used by students to complete and cheat on assignments. Your establishment needs to determine boundaries for how they can be used for work, how generative AI sources need to be cited, and what usage counts as cheating.
Data privacy and security
Data security is one of the biggest concerns of AI tools, especially when it comes to sensitive pupil data, so your policy must define what data cannot be put into AI tools. It’s important you make people who are new to using AI aware of the data privacy risks, as screenshots or data shared with the tools may be retained by the supplier for a range of different purposes.
Ethical considerations
Your AI policy should clearly set out how AI tools are supervised and recorded, and how your Safeguarding Lead will respond to any problems should they arise. It should also include how long student data is stored, where it’s stored, and how long it’s stored for.
Legal requirements
Your establishment needs to show that every AI tool your school uses complies with UK GDPR, the Data Protection Act, and the DfE’s filtering and monitoring guidance. It should include the lawful basis for processing data, encryption standards, and breach-report timelines, as well.
4 tips for implementing your AI policy
Familiarise your staff with the policy
It’s critical your staff are fully informed on the policy, not just to ensure they use AI safely and ethically, but so they can support students using it and prevent or stop uses that violate school policy. You could set up a workshop to help your team explore the different parts of the policy, or simply walk them through it in a meeting – so long as they understand why it’s important, grasp use cases to look out for, and know how to implement the policy.
Hold an assembly
Like with any important topic or policy change, an assembly is a great way to educate pupils on AI and what the new rules mean for them. For many AI novices, it’s easy to hear about people around the world using it every day for different use cases and assume they can do the same. Make sure pupils understand there are risks associated with AI just as much as there are opportunities for it to improve how they learn.
As AI can be quite a big, complex topic, we recommend going through example use cases that violate the policy to help them understand what kind of tools and uses aren’t allowed.
Create infographics or posters
Regular reminders of the risks of AI and which use cases violate the policy in the form of infographics shared via email or posters around a school are a great way to ensure the policy is always in the back of your pupils’ mind. You could even have your pupils make them as a fun, creative way to learn more about using AI in school.
Organise school activities to encourage learning about AI, like a debate
AI is a controversial topic, particularly in schools, and is perfect for a debate. It encourages students to learn the pros, cons, opportunities, and dangers of using AI in school, and will help them navigate the boundary of when using AI can have negative consequences.
Learn more about implementing AI in your school
Following our hugely popular AI webinars during the last academic year, on November 7th we’ll be hosting the fifth instalment of the series – AI Beyond the Classroom: From Prompt to Practice. To register for the webinar click here, and to watch recordings of our previous webinars click here.
