Imagine a classroom where every moment is maximized. Tests are graded instantly, attendance is automated and students receive feedback in seconds. In this environment, teachers are not replaced by artificial intelligence, but empowered by it, gaining more time to teach, debate complex topics and connect with students directly and personally. That concept is no longer a distant dream but the present reality for students across the world, where artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly becoming an integral part of the learning experience. 

For Joe Wagner, Blair’s Dean of Teaching of Learning, the arrival of tools like ChatGPT mark a watershed moment. “It’s as if we’re witnessing the dawn of the Internet again,” Mr. Wagner observes. “Everyone is trying to figure out the impact of a technology that has exploded and is going to reshape the world of work.” 

He’s not alone in that sentiment. Since its viral release in November 2022, ChatGPT has taken the world by storm. With more than 400 million users globally, including approximately half of the college students in the United States, ChatGPT has reshaped how the world interacts with information. Students can now draft essays, summarize readings and conduct research in seconds. Thanks to advancements in data processing, ChatGPT is also evolving at a staggering rate. OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, reports that the computational power of artificial intelligence has increased by an astounding 300,000 times in just six years, far surpassing the pace of growth in human cognitive capacity.

Recognizing AI’s vast and growing influence, Blair has tasked Mr. Wagner, along with Assistant Head of School for Academics Nathan Molteni, with the challenge of guiding the School through this new landscape. Together, they aim to harness AI’s potential while remaining mindful of ethical and developmental concerns that come with its use by students.

“Our job is to prepare our students for the jobs of tomorrow, but it is daunting to be out front on something that is changing so rapidly,” Mr. Molteni notes. 

A New Classroom Ally
To help Blair’s students learn to use generative artificial intelligence responsibly, Blair adopted Flint K-12 at the start of the 2024-2025 school year. A secure AI platform designed for schools, Flint K-12 is built on the ChatGPT 4o model and allows teachers to be in the same space as students when they use AI. Plainly speaking, it lets teachers see exactly what students ask and the response that AI generates.

“It is essentially ChatGPT with a lot of guardrails,” Mr. Wagner explains. “We want students to access help through AI, but AI should never be doing the learning for them. Flint K-12 allows Blair faculty to design the guardrails.” For instance, English teachers can direct the software to offer students writing tips while ensuring it never writes any portion of an essay. One key advantage, Mr. Wagner notes, is that students receive feedback in real time. “If kids can get answers to questions quicker and improve the rate they are learning as a result, that is a real benefit,” Mr. Wagner says.

From a teaching perspective, Blair’s faculty have reacted to Flint K-12 with a healthy blend of hesitancy and excitement.

In just the first month of school this year, there were 560 total sessions and 112 new “tutors,” representing the number of times that students or faculty at Blair logged in and asked the software to perform a task. While not all teachers have integrated Flint K-12 into their classrooms, some have embraced it fully. Language teacher Allan Issenchmidt, for example, uses Flint K-12 to create stories that incorporate French vocabulary words, adjusting the level of complexity based upon the class level. Language department chair Maria Issenchmidt, who generally prefers a low-tech approach to teaching, has also found use for the platform. “For a typical homework assignment, I program Flint K-12 with the assignment and the answer key. Now when students get an incorrect answer, they can ask ‘Why is this incorrect?’ and get an immediate response,” she says. “It has cut down significantly on those late-night ‘I don’t understand this’ emails. Plus, we can spend more class time speaking French, because less clarification is needed from the last assignment.”   

Mr. Molteni stresses the importance of finding ways of using AI to amplify the quality of student learning. “In the sciences, we’re seeing students use Flint K-12 to build learning tutors. If they have a quiz the next day, they set up a tutor to quiz them. Students are using AI like a study buddy.” 

“AI is a resource in students’ toolbox to help them,” adds Mr. Wagner. “For example, when teachers assign reading, we want students to engage with the text and have the interaction necessary to remember that passage. If we use AI to create a game or an activity around that text, we can support the memory and retention of what they’ve just read. It is a tool that helps them improve.” 

‘No Such Thing as an Expert’
In their mission to teach students to harness the power of artificial intelligence responsibly, Mr. Molteni and Mr. Wagner have plunged headfirst into the rapidly changing field. Mr. Molteni, however, is quick to point out one humbling reality: “There is no such thing as an expert when it comes to AI.” The first challenge the pair faced was, “How do we build the AI knowledge that Blair will need?” To tackle that, both educators began reading extensively and closely following thought leaders such as Ethan Mollick, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, who specializes in innovation and codirects Wharton’s Generative AI Labs. 

Mr. Wagner and Mr. Molteni also sought hands-on professional development, attending the Future Ready Brains Conference in New York City. The conference brought together neuroscientists, psychologists, researchers and educators to discuss adolescent brain development and the skills students need to thrive in this new frontier. “One thing we have discovered from all of our learning,” Mr. Molteni notes, “is that the technology changes so fast; it’s hard for anyone to remain well-versed in the topic for long.”

Keeping up with the pace of AI’s rapid evolution is just one of the challenges the technology presents. Mr. Wagner, who also teaches science at Blair, has other concerns as well. He notes, for instance, that the energy consumption of generative AI is staggering. Forbes recently reported that ChatGPT daily consumes the power equal to 180,000 U.S. households. “There are real issues with long-term sustainability,” Mr. Wagner points out, which all users should consider. There are also worries about data privacy and security. While Blair uses the Flint K-12 platform, which limits data access and sharing to the Blair community, other AI systems lack similar safeguards.

Of course, the concern topmost on the minds of many educators, like Mr. Wagner and Mr. Molteni, is ensuring that students don’t become overly dependent on AI for deep and critical thinking, writing, creativity or the host of other skills needed for the next chapter in their lives. “AI should be a helpful coworker,” Mr. Molteni explains. “We want to teach our students to use it the way you would ask a colleague for help—not do the work for them.” 

While schools may differ in their approaches to AI—ranging from prohibiting its use to allowing unlimited access—Blair’s vision for AI in the classroom is clear: to continue using it responsibly to enhance learning. For, as Mr. Wagner succinctly puts it, “This is about preparing our students to be AI literate. With the amount of money and resources being poured into AI, it is clear the technology is here to stay. We are preparing students not just to use AI, but to navigate a world shaped by it.”