After a slow trickle of adoption, more school districts are training their teachers to use artificial intelligence than ever before, with even more planning to do so next school year. However, many leaders are providing AI training themselves.
More than 50% of school districts have reported providing AI training to their staff, a new nationally representative survey from the RAND Corporation suggests. That’s more than double the proportion of districts that reported doing so last fall.
District leaders told researchers that their training programs—before covering instructional tools—address teachers’ fear and discomfort with AI. Many leaders reported adopting a “do-it-yourself” approach to teacher training after not being able to find external partners.
The do-it-yourself approach “required leaders to identify learning objectives, create or curate technical content and design training formats either from scratch or with a patchwork of internal and external resources,” the report reads.
More than one-third of the leaders based their hands-on approach to creating training programs on their own experimentation with AI tools.
“The first AI [professional development] I got as a superintendent was super overwhelming and it scared me… [If this is what teachers get], they won’t want to do anything with AI and just put blinders on,” one leader said in the survey.
Another leader said that it has been difficult to find well-established experts who are knowledgeable about AI in educational contexts.
Here are some additional findings:
- Training and support can address educators’ fears and reluctance: Teachers’ concerns should be openly discussed. Training shouldn’t be done in-house, but through teacher training organizations and technical assistance providers.
- Low-poverty districts are more likely to implement AI training: State and federal education agencies, philanthropy and technical assistance providers must prioritize funding high-poverty districts.
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