AI at Vistamar School

Since ChatGPT’s release nearly three years ago, my colleagues and I have also been grappling with its use in the classroom. We have read the myriad articles and studies. We have debated at the lunch tables and in our department meetings. Teachers have sought out and completed PD. We have tinkered with it and other LLMs, both for fun, to see how it handles our everyday tasks, and with our students. 

Vistamar prides itself on being a place that is constantly thinking about doing school differently, which means we are consistently evaluating our program. What do our students need to live a life well lived? How does our program prepare them for a life well lived? And now, how do AI tools play into our program?

Early on, AI tools were immediately handy for brainstorming ideas, generating sample thesis statements, modeling the solutions to math problems, and describing trends in data. As a staffulty, we remained cautious overall; we gained familiarity with the tools, explored their use with students, but by and large we stuck with tried and true curricula. 

Many of our students, however, were far less cautious about using AI, and began to use it in ways that were both helpful and unhelpful to their learning. The Humanities Department, tasked with helping students develop writing skills, bore the brunt of a cat-and-mouse game of assigning a piece of writing, receiving something that appears AI-generated, running work through AI checkers, and holding subsequent conversations on academic integrity. Teachers shifted to assigning more in-class writing using pen and paper, but the loss of engaging students in the process of writing and revision, not to mention the ease of typing and the difficulty of reading their handwriting, has been significant. We added the Digiexam platform, which locks down student computers during exams, to our toolkit so that we can help students develop critical thinking and grow their writing skills.  

While, Digiexam has proven helpful for assessing student work in an in-class setting, it is just one facet of our approach to AI use. After years of tinkering and discussion, we have landed on a philosophy rooted in humanity and in line with our Portrait of a Vistamar Student. At Vistamar, we expect students to grapple with complex ideas and to express and defend their thinking in their own voices. We feel these qualities are essential for intellectual independence. We also know that AI can be an efficient tool for teaching and learning. As such, we will employ the use of AI with care. As we move forward, the question of AI use is not merely one of academic integrity; it is in ensuring our students are prepared to navifate an AI world. 

Approaching any new development or tool in education with care is our ethical duty as teachers. And, our concerns about unchecked AI use among developing brains have thus far been validated in early research and observations. AI’s impact on academic Stamina and emotional intelligence, both essential outcomes of schooling for young people, make educators uneasy.

However, our commitment to doing school differently means that we remain curious and committed to a learner’s mindset. Gathering data helps us learn, so this year we surveyed students on their AI use and facilitated several conversations with students in advisory and in Morning Meeting. We learned that students feel conflicted about using AI for their classes and have concerns about AI’s accuracy, impact on the environment, and its use of artwork without permission. They worry about how AI will change society, their future job prospects, and even if it is making people less intellectually capable. Student thinking on AI was not all concern - they also expressed excitement and appreciation, sharing how they use LLMs like ChatGPT or Gemini to support their academic work. Specifically, they pointed out using ChatGPT’s study mode as a tutor or test-prep partner and using AI for writing support, both for brainstorming ideas and for getting help with word choice. 

Our commitment to curiosity is also evident in our professional learning time this spring. We are excited to welcome Mateo Romano, Parent ‘26, to lead a group of staffulty through a series of workshops next month on critical AI skills - writing effective prompts, creating bots, and using projects. We will also spend a day in June learning with educational thought-leader Eric Hudson. We gathered questions for him in a recent staffulty meeting and will survey staffulty again before his visit so he has everything he needs to lead us through a conversation seeking to answer the question, “What do students need to know and be able to do in an AI world?”

When I started teaching, my most often used tech tool in the classroom was an overhead projector and Google was not a thing. While I realize the immensity of both AI’s current and future impact on everything, I also feel a sense of calm because teachers are trained to navigate change with our values at the helm. When we consider new teaching strategies and technology, we do so with a balance of care and curiosity, keeping student learning at the center of our pedagogical choices. Working at Vistamar, I trust our community’s commitment to centering relationships, belonging, connection, and teaching students how to think. Our program will evolve - all good programs do - but our shifts will be responsive, not reactive, and hold dear what we believe to be most essential to the privilege of education: empowering young people to “embrace lives of learning, integrity, and purpose.”