Perrysburg schools to pilot controlled AI tools for students with privacy safeguards and parent guide
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Summary
The Perrysburg Exempted Village district outlined a phased rollout of classroom AI tools, planned teacher professional development on Jan. 5 and student access on Jan. 6, and said vendors signed data-privacy agreements to limit retention; parents will receive a caregiver guide and teachers retain discretion over classroom use.
Unidentified Presenter (Speaker 3) said the Perrysburg Exempted Village school district will make a set of controlled artificial intelligence tools available to students after a period of teacher training and with data protections in place. The presenter said the rollout aims to "safeguard our students, but also give them the tools that they're going to be using for the foreseeable future."
The presenter told the board the district relied on a state AI toolkit for best practices and had required data-privacy agreements (DPAs) from vendors to limit how long student interactions are retained. "Everything we're looking at, we have data privacy agreements for," the presenter said, adding that the district removed automatic access to Google Gemini after the vendor enabled it without prior notice this fall.
Jason Hubbard, one of the district's teachers-on-special-assignment (TOSA) and the staff lead on the project, described how approved education platforms provide teacher dashboards that log student-AI interactions. "Because we have a DPA, the students can sign in with their Google account," Hubbard said, and teachers can view class transcripts and receive alerts if a student discusses self-harm or weapons. He framed those features as part of a protective "education shell" around the tools.
The district presented a list of approved platforms for secondary students that the board discussed: NotebookLM and Brisk (a Chrome extension that gates student access through teacher links), along with education-focused products such as SchoolAI, Magic School and Canva's AI features. The presenter emphasized that teachers will have a choice: they can ban AI in their classrooms or adopt it with human oversight. "You have to evaluate it. You have to have the human part of that to look at it and say, okay, is this accurate?" the presenter said.
Officials set a deployment window: professional development for staff on Jan. 5 and limited student access behind district filters beginning Jan. 6, while leaving day-to-day classroom decisions to teachers. The district also plans to post resources on its website and send a parent message after teacher materials are finalized. Board members requested a caregiver guide; presenter and staff said Rachel Zicker is developing a slideshow with links and talking points for parents.
District speakers framed AI as a tool for instruction, accessibility and simulation-based learning. Hubbard and other presenters gave examples including AI-created simulations to illustrate molecular behavior and using AI to reframe text at lower reading levels so more students can access curriculum. Leaders said they would continue piloting features and reconsider broader tools (like Gemini) as experience and comfort grow.
Next steps, as described at the meeting, include Jan. 5 staff training, posting the caregiver guide and launching limited student access on Jan. 6; the presentation did not propose or adopt new board policy during the public session.
