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Yorktown rolls out AI-enhanced site search to surface district information
Summary
The district demonstrated an AI-enhanced search (referred to as the YCSD AI assistant) that indexes district webpages and returns answers or links to district content. Technology staff said it is in beta, limited to district domains, and currently requires date-specific queries rather than relative terms.
Yorktown Central School District demonstrated an AI-enhanced site search at the Oct. 27 board meeting and announced a limited beta rollout on its website.
Superintendent Ron Hatter credited technology staff, including Brian, with developing the tool. Brian explained the assistant is not a fully conversational chatbot; rather, it indexes pages on the district27s domains and returns answers or links based on the pages provided to the search system. It will not search outside the district27s specified domains.
The tool returned specific, date-based information during a live demo (for example, menus for a given calendar date). Brian said the system currently struggles with relative-date queries such as "what's for lunch today," unless a date is provided, and the team is working on scripts to provide relative-time behavior.
Hatter and staff said the assistant is in early rollout and analytics are limited but are being collected. The district is considering adding a link/icon in the district mobile app to surface the assistant quickly. Board members and staff discussed mobile access, analytics for app vs. website use, and privacy/scope limitations; Brian said the system was restricted to district content and would not take users to external sites.
The district described the tool as an "AI-enhanced search" integrated with official pages and said it is intended to improve access to district policies, calendars, menus and department pages. The superintendent suggested a community naming contest for the assistant once the district moves beyond beta.
