On Sept. 2, Mayor Mamdani and Chancellor Samuels put forth what they called “the nation’s broadest generative AI moratorium in schools.” The moratorium will affect almost 600,000 public school students across New York City — two-thirds of total city enrollment.
The policy establishes a one-year moratorium during the 2026-2027 school year for student-facing generative AI for children in 2-K through 8th grade, according to the Office of the Mayor. The policy also introduces AI critical thinking modules for high schoolers twice a year, screen time restrictions and an AI pilot program for a small number of classrooms.
“The tech industry wants us to believe that A.I.-powered early education is not only inevitable, but necessary,” said Mamdani. “We do not see it that way.”
The policy, however, raises a series of questions and mixed reactions.
As reported by Chalkbeat, AI features will be disabled in 38 existing citywide ed tech contracts, but officials have not provided a comprehensive list of those companies.
Richard Buery, a former deputy mayor and CEO of the Robin Hood Foundation, raises concern about the plan's broad blanket restrictions. “While well-intentioned, a blanket one-year AI ban without exceptions on all uses through middle school is not the right call,” he said.
Similarly, State Senator Kristen Gonzalez, chair of the internet and technology committee, and New York City Council Member Carmen De La Rosa, chair of the committee on technology, issued a joint statement regarding the ban, saying that the law “goes a step forward, but falls short of responsible AI Use.”
Gonzalez and De La Rosa stated that AI should supplement learning rather than replace or endanger it and that the country’s largest public school system “has the opportunity to serve as a leader in informing the future of safe, responsible integration of technology into its educational ecosystem.”
Their concerns are mainly directed at the five pilot programs, which will be offered at a maximum of five classes per high school and will use direct supervision of an educator to integrate AI tools.
Gonzalez and De La Rosa say that these programs “are being implemented in high schools with no prior evaluation criteria established.” They called on Chancellor Samuels to postpone the pilots until they can be more properly assessed.
Tech:NYC President and CEO Julie Samuels doesn’t see the program as an exclusion of tech readiness in public schools. “AI and technology are central to New York’s economic future,” she said, citing that New York City now has more tech jobs than the Bay Area.
While encouraged by the access that AI gives students in the workforce and recommending that the access be increased in the future, Samuels also said that “strong guardrails should enable age-appropriate learning that puts safety first.”
