NYC’s AI ban through grade 8 sets stage for rest of US, experts say

The ban will last for one year and impact 600,000 students.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced a one-year AI ban in elementary and middle public schools for the 2026-2027 school year [File: Heather Khalifa/Reuters]

New York City’s ban on use of artificial intelligence in the classroom for elementary and middle school students in the city’s public school system – the largest in the country – could set the stage for how other school systems in the United States tailor their approach to the use of AI, experts say.

The moratorium, which was announced on Wednesday, will last for one year and will end the use of 40 different educational tools impacting 600,000 students. The ban will not bar teachers from using the technology to create lesson plans.

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“Children need teachers and human connection in order to learn and grow. They need to develop skills alongside their peers, build relationships with educators and wrestle with tough problems on their own,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a news conference on Wednesday.

“The tech industry wants us to believe that AI-powered early education is not only inevitable, but necessary. We do not see it that way.”

Mamdani added that the city will spend the next year studying how the policy will impact students. The city’s public school system will also launch a pilot programme in high schools for a limited number of students.

Among the tools being tested will be the maths AI platform Edia, which will provide “step-by-step coaching” and prompting students to explain their reasoning. Its use will be limited to 20 minutes each week. Another tool, Quill, will be used in English language arts courses and will be limited to 15 minutes each week.

“The mayor is giving schools, parents, scholars the runway to study what the impact on our education system these tools will actually have,” Adin Lenchner, founder of the New York-based political consultancy Carroll Street Campaigns, told Al Jazeera.

“This feels like the kind of leadership that people were actually hungry for — standing up to corporate interests and looking out for students.”

The policy also implements staggered screen-time restrictions, with use limited to less than 45 minutes each day through eighth grade.

The policy also bans “companion chatbots” through high school. City Hall did not elaborate on Al Jazeera’s request for clarification on what that covers.

The moratorium comes at a consequential time for New York City’s public schools. Reading proficiency scores tumbled by 6 percent in 2025 among students in grades 3 through 8.

Experts say that New York City may set the stage for how other school districts approach AI.

“NYC public schools banning AI in elementary and middle schools sends an important message because it is the largest school district in the US. However, it is hard to know the effectiveness of the ban because they haven’t shared the enforcement mechanism,” Margeret Murry associate professor of communication at the University of Michigan, told Al Jazeera.

AI’s impact on learning

The mayor’s decision comes alongside a growing number of reports showing that AI use in children’s education can have a negative impact on cognitive development.

A comprehensive review of 400 studies, along with interviews with teachers, parents and other educators conducted by the Brookings Institution’s Center for Universal Education, concluded that the negatives of generative AI in the classroom outweigh the positives. However, the report stressed that careful and limited implementation in specific use cases can help enrich learning outcomes.

“It’s in line with the science,” Shaleen Title, an attorney at Rudick Law Group and adjunct professor at Roger Williams University School of Law focusing on emerging sectors like AI, said of the mayor’s move.

“The most important thing about it is that it changes the approach. Before, the approach was to let students use technology without really vetting the risks, whereas now, the default is that the products have to be proven safe before they can be used by students, which I think is the right approach. I think it was a smart reversal on their part.”

One recurring theme outlined in the Brooking Institution’s was what researchers described as a “digitally induced ‘amnesia”, in which students were unable to recall basic factual information about topics they had studied or submitted work on.

That theme continues into adolescence and young adulthood. A January 2025 report in the peer-reviewed sociology journal Societies found that people aged 17 to 25 who relied more heavily on AI had lower levels of critical-thinking ability.

For those bound for university, professors are starting to notice the effects. A College Board report found that 84 percent of faculty believe AI erodes students’ critical-thinking skills.

In a piece published in the Chronicle of Higher Education, a trade publication, an adjunct professor at several universities said his students appear increasingly unable to keep up with reading and writing tasks that students were able to handle a decade ago.

While the city can push back on AI use in the classroom, regulating its use at home will be harder.

“This is something we’ve actually been obviously dealing with for quite a few years. The idea around this policy is to make sure that we get to limitations. I think we ought not to forget that last year there was AI usage in our school,” New York City Public Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels said in a news conference when asked about AI use for homework.

“This policy seeks to limit that and seeks to expand our teachers and our understanding of how to combat the external use of AI when it’s used at home.”

The ban does have some exceptions, including for students with disabilities and “multilingual learners”, as well as in environments where students are taking part in “career readiness programs, like computer science”.

“They’re probably going to want to use generative AI in their coding classes, for example. They were also very clear in their announcement that sometimes generative AI will be needed for disabilities and accommodations. So certainly, there’s an exception and a place for it in schools,” Title added.

The announcement also said students will be given access to two yearly AI literacy courses, which are designed to help understand the technology as well as bias and ethical issues that stem from AI use.

禁令将持续一年，影响60万名学生。

纽约市市长佐兰·马姆达尼宣布，从 2026-2027 学年开始，公立小学和初中将禁止使用人工智能一年。[图片：Heather Khalifa/路透社]

专家表示，纽约市禁止在其公立学校系统（全美最大的公立学校系统）的小学和初中课堂上使用人工智能，这可能会为美国其他学校系统如何调整其人工智能使用方式树立榜样。

这项于周三宣布的禁令将持续一年，届时将停止使用40种不同的教育工具，影响60万名学生。该禁令并不禁止教师使用这些技术来制定教学计划。

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“孩子们需要老师和人际交往才能学习和成长。他们需要与同龄人一起发展技能，与教育者建立关系，并独立解决难题，”市长佐兰·马姆达尼在周三的新闻发布会上说。

“科技行业想让我们相信，人工智能驱动的早期教育不仅不可避免，而且是必要的。我们并不这么认为。”

马姆达尼补充说，市政府将在未来一年研究这项政策对学生的影响。市公立学校系统还将在部分高中学生中启动试点项目。

测试的工具包括数学人工智能平台Edia，它将提供“循序渐进的辅导”，并引导学生解释他们的解题思路。该平台每周使用时间限制为20分钟。另一款工具Quill将用于英语语言艺术课程，每周使用时间限制为15分钟。

“市长给了学校、家长和学者们时间来研究这些工具对我们的教育系统究竟会产生什么影响，”总部位于纽约的政治咨询公司 Carroll Street Campaigns 的创始人 Adin Lenchner 告诉半岛电视台。

“这感觉正是人们真正渴望的那种领导力——敢于对抗企业利益，为学生着想。”

该政策还实施了分阶段的屏幕时间限制，八年级及以下学生每天使用时间不得超过 45 分钟。

该政策还禁止高中阶段使用“陪伴聊天机器人”。市政府没有就半岛电视台要求澄清的具体范围做出进一步说明。

这项暂停令出台的时机对纽约市公立学校来说至关重要。到2025年，3至8年级学生的阅读能力分数将下降6%。

专家表示，纽约市的做法可能会为其他学区如何对待人工智能树立榜样。

“纽约市公立学校禁止在小学和初中使用人工智能，这传递了一个重要的信息，因为它是美国最大的学区。然而，由于他们没有公开执行机制，因此很难知道这项禁令的效果如何，”密歇根大学传播学副教授玛格丽特·默里告诉半岛电视台。

人工智能对学习的影响

市长的决定正值越来越多的报告显示人工智能在儿童教育中的应用会对认知发展产生负面影响之际。

布鲁金斯学会全球教育中心对400项研究进行了全面回顾，并采访了教师、家长和其他教育工作者，最终得出结论：生成式人工智能在课堂上的负面影响大于正面影响。然而，该报告强调，在特定应用场景中谨慎且有限地实施生成式人工智能，有助于提升学习效果。

“这符合科学，”鲁迪克律师事务所的律师、罗杰·威廉姆斯大学法学院兼职教授沙琳·泰特尔（Shaleen Title）在谈到市长的举动时说道，她专注于人工智能等新兴领域。

“最重要的是，它改变了方法。以前，学校的做法是让学生使用科技产品，而没有真正评估其风险；而现在，默认的做法是产品必须先被证明安全才能供学生使用，我认为这才是正确的做法。我认为这是一个明智的转变。”

布鲁金斯学会的研究报告中反复出现的一个主题是研究人员所描述的“数字诱发的‘失忆症’”，即学生无法回忆起他们学习过或提交过作业的主题的基本事实信息。

这一趋势延续到青少年和青年时期。2025年1月发表在同行评审社会学期刊《社会》（Societies）上的一份报告发现，17至25岁的人群中，那些更依赖人工智能的人，其批判性思维能力较低。

对于那些即将进入大学的学生来说，教授们已经开始注意到人工智能的影响。美国大学理事会的一份报告显示，84%的教师认为人工智能会削弱学生的批判性思维能力。

在高等教育纪事报（一份行业刊物）上发表的一篇文章中，一位在几所大学担任兼职教授的人士表示，他的学生似乎越来越无法完成十年前他们能够完成的阅读和写作任务。

虽然市政府可以限制人工智能在课堂上的使用，但要监管其在家庭中的使用则更加困难。

“这其实是我们多年来一直在处理的问题。这项政策的理念是确保我们设定一些限制。我认为我们不应该忘记，去年我们学校就使用了人工智能，”纽约市公立学校总监卡马尔·塞缪尔斯在新闻发布会上被问及人工智能在家庭作业中的应用时说道。

“这项政策旨在限制这种情况，并旨在扩大我们的教师队伍，增进我们对如何打击在家中使用人工智能的外部行为的理解。”

该禁令也有一些例外情况，包括残疾学生和“多语言学习者”，以及学生参加“职业准备计划，如计算机科学”的环境。

“例如，他们可能希望在编程课上使用生成式人工智能。他们在公告中也明确表示，有时需要使用生成式人工智能来帮助残障人士和提供特殊安排。所以，在学校里，生成式人工智能肯定有其特殊用途和用武之地，”Title补充道。

公告还指出，学生每年将有机会参加两门人工智能素养课程，旨在帮助他们了解这项技术以及人工智能使用中产生的偏见和伦理问题。