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Northville to narrow AI pilot to one tool per instructional category; task force to guide choices
Summary
Chief academic staff told the board the district will narrow a year‑long AI pilot to about one vendor per category (instructional assistance, student engagement, student voice/reflection, interactive video) and will form an AI task force of staff volunteers.
District leaders told the board they will narrow an ongoing AI pilot so the district purchases fewer tools next year and focuses on a limited set of platforms that serve K‑12 needs.
Superintendent RJ Weber introduced the update and said the district has been piloting multiple AI tools in classrooms and will use usage data to reduce subscriptions. The district’s chief academic officer (Ms. Polanski) said analysis by IT staff and usage reports showed several tools with low adoption, naming PowerBuddies, SchoolPsychAI and DiffIt as examples the district does not plan to renew.
Polanski told the board the pilot tools have been organized into four categories — instructional assistance (chatbot‑style), student engagement platforms, student voice/reflection tools and interactive video learning — and that the district’s goal is to select about one vendor in each category by the end of the year. She cited overlapping feature sets among products such as SchoolAI, Magic School and Brisk and said acquisitions in the edtech market complicate vendor selection.
“We will be announcing in a couple weeks the opportunity for staff to join the AI task force,” Polanski said, adding the task force will include teachers from kindergarten through secondary grades to ensure the selections meet diverse classroom needs. The district also plans a timeline for board updates and will use another year of pilot data to refine decisions.
Board members asked how a single tool could meet K‑12 needs across grade spans; Polanski said vendors are evolving to cover broader capabilities and emphasized the need for a diverse internal task force to evaluate grade‑level differences and privacy/security implications.
No formal action was taken; staff said they will present a selection timeline to the board and involve building administrators and classroom teachers in the evaluation process.
