NYC mayor Mamdani imposes 1 year ban on AI for schools through 8th grade

NYC mayor Mamdani imposes 1 year ban on AI for schools through 8th grade(nyc.gov)

47 points by DeepLogin 6 days ago | 11 comments

sicktriple 6 days ago |

I don't see a problem with this. AI can be useful but the pressure to use it as a shortcut to mastery can be very strong. Kids need to develop the reflex to think critically before they reach for the LLM.

JLO64 6 days ago |

While I don’t have a positive opinion on the current attempts to use AI within education, I do question if a complete moratorium is the best way to go about it right now. Despite whatever the mayor says, students will use AI with or without express permission. Acting as if this isn’t the case might be detrimental towards educators trying to deal with it.

Grombobulous 6 days ago | |

It’s not a ban on AI in kids’ private lives, it’s a ban on using it in class and for schoolwork.

It’s also only up until 8th grade. High school is a great time to have some coursework covering AI.

It’s also not a moratorium forever. Rules can always be changed.

Somewhat related, smartphone bans in schools have really positive outcomes.

nextaccountic 6 days ago | |

The important part I think is not the ban on kids pre 8th grade, but that high schoolers are getting courses on AI literacy

bigstrat2003 6 days ago | |

There have always been people dishonest enough to cheat in school. That doesn't mean that cheating shouldn't be banned.

ChrisArchitect 6 days ago |

[dupe] Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49542443

alexnewman 6 days ago |

I support this. Education should be reserved to the fancy private schools. Public school should be able drugs and getting laid. That was my experience anyways

rvz 6 days ago |

Quite of a bad idea to put a complete ban like that.

Meanwhile in China they are doing the opposite [0] an are not imposing a complete ban (except for unsupervised use of generative AI).

Children are required to have adult supervision to use AI chatbots for the purpose of learning the skills that require understanding AI systems and programming them or assisted-leaning in STEM subjects.

[0] https://english.www.gov.cn/news/202604/15/content_WS69df29e6...

npunt 6 days ago | |

You're making the mistake of comparing a possible future for the present. This is like the most common mistake people in tech make when it comes to education. I've seen it for >15 years and built a whole edtech news organization to try to educate engineers about this kind of fallacy.

The NYC policy is for this school year (now). The link you provide begins with "China aims to build". Not "China is deploying to one of their largest school systems". If its referring to this policy [1], that's a plan for 2035. Apples and oranges.

[1] https://www.gov.cn/zhengce/zhengceku/202604/content_7065138....

cdrnsf 6 days ago | |

The current administration has shown no interest in regulating AI or addressing its harms so I see no problem with a city making this choice.

okdood64 6 days ago | |

I'm all for regulation of AI, but it's not practical.

I fear we're going to regulate ourselves to death (hyperbole) with regards to AI in the Western world, while China is just going to go brrr.