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.
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. 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 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. 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.
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.
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