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Hillsboro SD 1J presents AI guidance, emphasizes student safety and teacher controls
Summary
District staff outlined generative-AI guidance and approved classroom tools including Magic School and Google’s Gemini, stressing three priorities: empowering learning, responsible use, and protecting student privacy. Presenters said teachers will control student access and monitor interactions via teacher-admin panels and automated flags.
Hillsboro School District 1J officials on Nov. 19 presented their generative artificial‑intelligence guidance and demonstrated approved staff and student tools intended to speed lesson planning and provide personalized practice while protecting student privacy.
Betsy, a district presenter, said the guidance rests on three priorities: “empowering learning, ensuring responsible use, and protecting privacy.” She told the board the district values “student safety more than innovation” and that the guidance is designed to be flexible and responsive as tools evolve.
Presenters described a set of approved products for staff and for controlled student use. The district highlighted Magic School and its Magic Student mode, Google’s Gemini, Microsoft Copilot for staff email support, and a document‑sourcing model the presenters called Notebook LM. Presenters said Magic School provides more than 80 preset teacher tools, enables teachers to open student features only during a teacher‑controlled window, and stores teacher views of student interactions so staff can review work and flag concerns.
“Magic School saves educators loads of time because they can go in, say I’m looking for a rubric … and it’s going to generate that for them,” Becky, another presenter, told the board. She described teachers as “prompt engineers” who must review AI outputs and use professional judgment — the district’s so‑called “human in the loop” approach.
District staff said the Magic Student environment is a ‘walled garden’: students cannot access tools unless a teacher enables them, and the system provides analytics and automated flags for potentially inappropriate content. For higher‑stakes or open internet tools such as Gemini, staff said the district is restricting student access until safety and privacy reviews are complete.
Presenters also discussed Amira, an AI‑driven literacy practice tool used in the district’s high‑dosage tutoring programs. They described Amira as listening to students read aloud, identifying error patterns within milliseconds, providing scaffolded prompts, and generating teacher recommendations for small‑group instruction.
District staff emphasized training and safeguards: teachers receive professional development on bias and accuracy checks, are asked not to input personally identifiable information, and work with the district tech services team to vet new capabilities before student rollout.
The presentation concluded with board questions about monitoring capacity, filtering and network controls, and how teacher workload is managed. Staff said they will continue to refine guidance as the technology evolves and to pilot student features under teacher supervision.
