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Board member urges elevating AI safeguards to formal policy, proposes technology advisory council
Summary
At a Gateway SD study session, a board member urged the board to elevate administrative AI rules into district policy, require vendor contracts to guarantee data privacy and security, and convene outside experts (including Carnegie Mellon) and a technology advisory council to guide ongoing reviews.
A Gateway SD board member urged the district on Jan. 13 to elevate certain administrative rules governing artificial intelligence into formal board policy, saying contracts with AI vendors should explicitly require data privacy, security and legal compliance and that the district should convene outside experts before piloting classroom AI tools.
The unnamed board member told colleagues the current administrative regulations are a good start but "contracts with AI vendors must include provisions ensuring data privacy, security and compliance with everything," and recommended moving key provisions from administrative regulations into policy so the board has a stronger, more durable framework.
Why it matters: board members said AI tools are already being discussed for uses such as student engagement monitoring. The board member offered a concrete example — an eye‑tracking program that gauges whether students are paying attention — as a promising instructional tool but warned that "the downstream use of that data collected could be troublesome," arguing the district needs contractual and policy safeguards to prevent misuse.
Dr. Rossi, the district administrator who presented policies for display, supported getting wider input and noted the board will put the draft policies on display at the next action meeting to allow public review. Board members discussed inviting academic and industry experts, mentioning Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pittsburgh and regional PSBA resources as possible partners to help craft robust, evolving policy language.
Board members noted that AI policy cannot be static. "With AI a policy is not to sit there for three years," one participant said, urging the district to plan for frequent policy reviews as state and federal guidance evolves. The group referenced pending state legislation and the need to align district policy with applicable privacy laws such as the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).
Next steps: the board asked staff to continue policy committee work, to place the AI‑related policies on display for public comment at the next action meeting, and to convene a technology advisory council and external experts for guidance. No formal action to adopt policy was taken at the study session.
