A Chromebook issued to a state school student in Goiás, Brazil, in May 2024. Illustrative. Image: Emerson Júnior Gonçalves da Silva Figueiredo / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped
Schools that want AI kept away from their students will soon face a blunt choice from Google: accept Google Search with its AI built in, or lose Search altogether. In a blog post on Tuesday, Google said Gemini, Gemini Notebook, Gemini in Classroom and Google Search will all be “entirely off” for K-12 student accounts until school administrators explicitly turn them on. Its education chief has made clear that switching off the AI means switching off Search too.
What Google is changing #
The post, by Chris Phillips, Google’s vice president and general manager of education, walks back the company’s push to put Gemini in front of every student. Google switched Gemini on for students by default earlier this year, which caught many school districts off guard and fed a backlash from parents and teachers. Google says it is changing course “after listening to schools, teachers, leading researchers, and policymakers”.
Under the new approach, each of the four products starts switched off for K-12 student accounts and has to be enabled by an administrator. Google says it will “share more specifics with schools in the coming months” before the change rolls out. Chalkbeat reports that Google will start testing the changes with a small group of US schools this month and roll them out more widely early in the new year.
The other half of the announcement is Guided Learning, a Gemini mode that coaches students with questions and step-by-step breakdowns instead of handing over answers. It is available worldwide in Google Classroom from today, and Google is building it into Search for student accounts, starting with a pilot in selected US schools later this month. Google’s example: a student who pastes in a physics problem or asks for help with a book report will get prompts to work through it, not the finished answer. Chalkbeat reports that Guided Learning will replace AI Overviews when students search on school accounts.
“They have the choice to not have Search on at all” #
What Google’s post doesn’t spell out is that Search can’t be separated from its AI. Phillips told Chalkbeat that AI is deeply integrated into Google Search and cannot simply be turned off, so a school that wants no AI will have to give up Search for its students:
If a school is not comfortable with that and simply wants AI off, then they have the choice to not have Search on at all. Chris Phillips, vice president and general manager of education at Google, to Chalkbeat
Phillips said Google is “excited” the changes “will promote that productive struggle” and help students learn.
A choice few schools can make #
Child-safety campaigners have been asking for exactly the control Google is now refusing. In July, Common Sense Media’s Youth AI Safety Institute rated AI Overviews and AI Mode an “unacceptable risk” for children after more than 2,600 searches on accounts set up for 11 and 15-year-olds. It found AI Mode produced full answers to all 180 homework assignments it tested, missed clear signs of children in crisis, and noted that schools and parents can’t switch the AI answers off. It asked Google to turn them off by default for minors and give schools controls that don’t exist.
Eisha Bush, head of teaching and learning at Common Sense Media, told Chalkbeat that dropping Search isn’t a realistic option for most schools:
The likelihood of schools and students avoiding Google Search is really slim to none.
Eisha Bush, Common Sense Media, to Chalkbeat
Pressure has also come from Washington. Last month Senators Josh Hawley and Richard Blumenthal wrote to Sundar Pichai asking why Google’s AI can’t be switched off on school Chromebooks, with answers due on November 2. Google hasn’t said whether Tuesday’s changes are part of its reply. Some of the biggest US districts, including New York City and Los Angeles, have already restricted student use of AI.
Who it affects #
The changes apply to K-12 student accounts in Google Workspace for Education, which schools use around the world, from the US, Canada and the UK to Germany, Australia, Brazil and India. Google says Google Classroom alone is used by 150 million students and teachers worldwide. Guided Learning in Classroom is global now; the Search pilot is US-only for the moment, and Google hasn’t given dates for other countries. The new default applies only to K-12 student accounts, not to teachers.
Why it matters #
Google is giving schools an off switch for its AI, but tying it to the tool students use most for research on school laptops. Since few schools will give up Search, most students will keep getting AI in their results, now in Guided Learning form, on Google’s terms rather than their school’s.
Sources: Google (Chris Phillips); Chalkbeat (interviews with Chris Phillips and Eisha Bush); Common Sense Media.