Many Oklahoma schools have already embraced artificial intelligence in the classroom as districts set guardrails and guide its use.
“It feels a little like building the airplane while it’s flying,” said Shaun Ross, superintendent of Epic Charter Schools, the state’s largest online school, which implemented an AI policy this summer, encouraging students to use AI for brainstorming, dissecting complex texts, or perfecting grammar and writing, but not for comprehension or research.
Oklahoma is one of 13 states with a law regulating AI in education, and it requires every district to enact an AI policy by next school year. Some already have. Meanwhile, the technology is in students’ hands, powering reading tutors and chatbots ready to help with homework — or do it for them.
Preventing cheating and ensuring students don’t pass off AI-generated work as their own is one major challenge facing districts.
AI tools can write entire essays and instantly answer quiz questions, giving students shortcuts. That’s required educators to rethink how they test students’ knowledge, district leaders said, such as writing in class instead of turning in a paper written as homework.
Tools to catch plagiarized work, such as AI detection software, are so unreliable they shouldn’t be used, said Karen Leonard, director of the state Education Department’s Office of AI and Digital Learning.
Instead, educators should set boundaries for every assignment, Leonard said. The Education Department recommends districts adopt a rating scale detailing the level of appropriate AI use, and have students cite AI if used, and link to chat logs and responses.
Despite the risks, some district leaders interviewed by Oklahoma Watch said it’s better for students to learn to use AI in a structured, supervised classroom. Without those skills, they fear students will be left behind.
“We’ve got to prepare our kids for what’s next,” said Mark Officer, assistant superintendent of teaching and learning at Owasso Public Schools. “We don’t want them to be at a disadvantage because we didn’t give them the opportunity to explore and learn.”
Owasso Public Schools implemented its AI policy this summer. Students in 8th through 12th grades already had school-approved access to Google Gemini, a generative AI tool. This year, the district expanded Google Gemini to students in third grade and up.
Officer said Gemini is a great engagement tool that can, for example, guide students as they learn about a particular topic. But teachers aren’t required to use it.
“It’s just a tool, not a curriculum piece,” he said.
Ross, Epic’s superintendent, said students are expected to use AI appropriately and in ways that benefit learning. Teachers are also expected to create lessons that help students think, not just click through.
The State Department of Education issued a model policy and guidance to help districts craft policies in line with the requirements under Senate Bill 1734, one of the only AI-related bills approved last session (bills to criminalize creating AI content of someone without their permission and to set age restrictions on human-like AI chatbots failed to progress).
Under the Oklahoma Responsible Technology in Schools Act, schools are prohibited from using AI as the primary basis for high-stakes decisions, such as student retention or promotion, discipline, placement or grading. District policies have to include protections for student data.
Educators or school staff maintain oversight and final decision-making authority over any output generated by an AI tool, under the law. Distinctions exist between AI tools used by teachers and those accessible to students.
For student-facing tools, districts must notify families what they are using and how and allow parents to opt out.
Leonard, at the Education Department, said the goal is to mitigate risks, keep students safe, and teach them to use AI appropriately and ethically.
“AI is not going away, and this is the least intelligent AI we’ll ever have,” Leonard said. “If we’re not providing AI literacy and guidance for our students, I feel we’re doing them a very big disservice.”
Screen Time
The scramble to set guardrails for AI comes amid a push to reduce students’ screen time and technology in schools. In 2025, the Legislature banned student smartphones to reduce distractions from learning, and efforts have also targeted time on other electronic devices.
A bill that would have limited screen time to one hour per day for elementary students passed the House of Representatives this year but stalled in the Senate.
Sen. Ally Seifried, R-Claremore, plans to introduce a version of the screen time bill next year; she also authored the cell phone ban legislation and the AI bill. They all go hand in hand, she said, to ensure elementary students receive strong foundational skills, such as reading and math, fine motor skills such as holding a pencil, and build relationships.
“AI should support, and not replace educators,” Seifried said. “We want to make sure we’re keeping that human interaction between a teacher and student.”
Under the state guidelines, students are only supposed to use AI under adult supervision. But several school district leaders said students have access to AI tools on district-issued devices outside of school and they rely on monitoring software to catch misuse.
Google’s Gemini has versions with added protections for minors, but an evaluation last year by Common Sense Media found it still shared inappropriate and unsafe content to children, including material related to sex, drugs, alcohol and unsafe mental health advice.
There’s no consensus on what ages AI use is appropriate for, and the Education Department’s guidance doesn’t address it, leaving districts to set their own guardrails. Epic, for instance, authorizes Google Gemini only for students 13 and older, but in Owasso, students have access starting in third grade.
Brad Browning, an Edmond parent of five, said children need time to master human skills and acquire baseline knowledge before using AI. For a kindergartener, he doesn’t think it’s appropriate at all, but he said he’d be okay with limited use in middle school and a bit more in high school.
He said he’s concerned students will rely on technology, including AI, as a replacement for thinking.
“We live with it by still teaching kids how to be human, because those are going to be the invaluable pieces of the marketplace of the future, no matter where this AI tech stuff goes,” Browning said.
Jennifer Palmer has been a reporter with Oklahoma Watch since 2016 and covers education. Contact her at (405) 761-0093 or jpalmer@oklahomawatch.org. Follow her on Twitter @jpalmerOKC.
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