by Susan Van Gelder
On Aug. 26 in a “landmark settlement,” Meta agreed to pay $18 billion over 10 years to multiple states and to strengthen child safety in its products (immediately?). Literally thousands of individuals, all 50 states, school districts and coalitions have initiated lawsuits against Meta and other Big Tech companies, vowing to make these changes industry-wide. The company, worth $147 billion, will institute a default two-hour limit on screen time and silence notifications during school and sleep times. Meta also promised greater account privacy. States like Massachusetts want half of their share of the money to fund youth mental health and after-school programs.
CONTROLLING ‘EDUCATIONAL’ AI
High school students in Boston (July 17-19) voting on a framework for the use of AI in schools. Photo: Eric Haynes/Edward M. Kennedy Institute, CC.
On Sept. 2, in response to parent and teacher demands, New York City announced a policy of AI restriction in public schools that could bring major changes to teaching and learning. New York has already planned to remove AI from 38 educational “products” in current use.
The rapid developments of AI itself exacerbate the difficulty, in both theory and practice, not only of what to do to control educational AI, but how to do it. Both the Meta settlement and New York City’s new AI policy represent mass resistance to the 47th president’s attempts to control people’s thought. The lens of educational policies, institutions and practices both captures and reflects the contradictions within society about the purpose of education, and the disconnect between schooling and attaining meaningful work and a life of self-development and creativity.
Everyone is affected by what kind of citizens and workers young people become. New research links “learning loss” to the widespread adoption of smart cell phones around 2012, well before COVID elevated it into the public awareness. Research supports what so many parents and educators have observed: More children experience depression; suicide has increased; attention spans have markedly decreased and addictive behavior with devices and sites like Tik-Tok are now commonplace, for all ages. Excessive time on devices has left children and teens shockingly ignorant of the world around them. The implications of these cognitive and behavioral changes are scary, but even more scary are the unknown consequences which we have not yet seen.
THE NEED FOR ONGOING RESISTANCE
We need to study and support the ongoing resistance, but as a mere beginning. We do not want to return to an education that is measured only by standard tests or that aims to create docile workers for alienated production, dominated by automation and AI. Today we support important battles to defend the integrity of universities, to teach truth instead of whitewashed history, to keep banned books in school and public libraries and to reverse the damage of tech. We can fight for better conditions at local schools for teachers and students.
New coalitions of parents and teachers have been formed in the past two years to stop the spread of AI’s extremely alienating technology rapidly pouring into every nook and cranny of schooling without adequate constraints. But parent, student and teacher groups have long been rebelling against the flaws in education itself. At the very least we need to support demands for more teachers and teacher support workers in livable buildings where they can foster critical thinking and social, emotional and intellectual development, in tune with their communities but not limited by them.
We can explore so-called radical education ideas in the context of a philosophy of liberation, Marxist-Humanism, and find ways to bring that philosophy into education. It is vital to continue the organizing and the research to develop educational systems that enable children to grow into their full human potentialities.
Fascism wants to steal our minds and use our bodies for its own aggrandizement. Meanwhile we all need education so we can demand knowledge and resources[1] to fight for environmental health, preventive healthcare, safe and meaningful work with grassroots genuine political democracy to work for a truly human society.
1 See Teach Truth by Jesse Hagopian, Haymarket Books: 2025.