Microsoft, OpenAI, and a US Teachers’ Union Are Hatching a Plan to ‘Bring AI into the Classroom’

Microsoft and OpenAI are planning to announce Tuesday that they are helping to launch an AI training center for members of the second-largest teachers’ union in the US, according to details about the initiative that appear to have been inadvertently published early on YouTube.

The National Academy for AI Instruction will be based in New York City and aims to equip kindergarten up to 12th grade instructors in the American Federation of Teachers with “the tools and confidence to bring AI into the classroom in a way that supports learning and opportunity for all students,” according to the description of a publicly accessible YouTube livestream scheduled for Tuesday morning.

The YouTube page also lists Anthropic, which develops the Claude chatbot, as a collaborator on what’s described as a $22.5 million initiative to bring free “AI training and curriculum” to teachers.

The three AI companies and the union did not immediately respond to requests for comment about the information released on YouTube. On Monday, Microsoft and the union declined to share details ahead of an announcement planned for Tuesday morning in New York.

Schools have struggled over the past few years to keep pace with students’ adoption of AI chatbots such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Microsoft’s Copilot, and Google’s Gemini. While highly capable at helping write papers and solve some math problems, the technologies can also confidently make costly errors. And they have left parents, educators, and employers concerned about whether chatbots rob students of the opportunity to develop essential skills on their own.

Schools have deployed new tools to catch AI-assisted cheating, and teachers have begun rolling out lessons about what they view as responsible use of generative AI. Some educators use AI to help with the time-consuming work of developing teaching plans and materials, and they also tout how it has introduced greater interactivity and creativity in the classroom.

American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten has said that educators must have a seat at the table in how AI is integrated into their profession. The new national academy could help teachers better understand fast-changing AI technologies and evolve their curriculum to prepare students for a world in which the tools are core to many jobs.

But the program is likely to draw rebuke from some union members concerned about the commercial incentives of tech giants shaping what happens in US classrooms. Google, Apple, and Microsoft have competed for years to get their tools into schools in hopes of turning children into lifelong users. (Microsoft and OpenAI have also increasingly become competitors, despite a once-close relationship.)

Just last week, several professors in the Netherlands published an open letter calling for local universities to reconsider financial relationships with AI companies and ban AI use in the classroom. All-out bans appear unlikely amid the growing usage of generative AI chatbots. So AI companies, employers, and labor unions may be left to try to find some common ground.

The forthcoming training academy follows a partnership Microsoft struck in December 2023 to work with the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, or AFL-CIO, on developing and deploying AI systems. The American Federation of Teachers is part of the AFL-CIO, and Microsoft had said at the time it would work with the union to explore AI education for workers and students.

The federation’s website says it represents about 1.8 million workers, which beside K-12 teachers also includes school nurses and college staff. The National Education Association, the largest US teachers’ union, has about 3 million members, according to its website.