Maryville R-II begins work on policy
On Sept. 22, a group of educators and administrators gathered in the central office of the Maryville R-II School District to launch a new task force focused on the use of artificial intelligence at the district. The conversation was preliminary, with staff members reflecting on their own experiments with language learning models since the public launch of ChatGPT in Nov. 2022.
When it comes to AI use amongst staff, “I think we’re kind of all over the place,” said Middle School Principal Kate Lydon.
“Some of us are using it to the 10th degree: they know how to write the prompts, and they use it to simplify their lives," she said. “Others are just starting to dabble. And some are still scared, and it feels foreign.”
The district is beginning a structured process to bring teachers into alignment, share resources, and move towards a set of policies dictating AI use amongst students and staff. The effort comes after the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education released a set of policy guidelines in July encouraging school districts to regulate a technology that comes with numerous concerns for the world of education.
Student Services Coordinator at Maryville Brian Lynn follows the latest trends in education, often discussing developments with colleagues both in the district and in the state.
“My thought [when I saw the guidelines] was: ‘how do we need to get ahead of this, and what kind of policies or practices do we need to have in place?’” Lynn said. “Not so much for our teachers and how they use it, but for students, and how they’re going to interact with it.”
Lynn said there are a broad range of concerns amongst educators when it comes to the technology.
“You have some teachers that feel AI allows students to cheat…They think students will use it to get out of the work of learning,” he said. “But you have other people who say: ‘AI is a tool. It is here to stay. So, we have to prepare students to use AI to do their jobs effectively.”
Experiences at the district’s technical school demonstrate that tension. Northwest Technical offers Career and Industry Education (CTE) to prepare students for specific roles in the workforce.
“Our actions are based on the demands of industry partners,” explained Donovan Harris, who teaches Business at Northwest Technical.
“Basically, every industry is screaming at us: teach students to use the tools,” he said. Since ChatGPT was released in 2022, teachers at Northwest Technical have been trying to keep up with the evolving software.
Harris also teaches high school students in a traditional setting. “That’s where a lot of the academic papers and the writing comes in,” he said. One that side, he sees “panic” amongst educators, he said.
“If CTE is pushing overwhelmingly towards the use and implementation of AI, traditional k-12 is taking a very subtle approach forward.”
‘Cognitive load’ and deeper learning
Part of the challenge facing educators is preventing students from using AI platforms to circumvent work while introducing software into classrooms which might deepen learning.
Professor of History at Northwest Missouri State University Robert Voss studies the social use of technology and started a consulting firm to help local businesses and schools, including Maryville R-II, implement AI software.
Considering the challenge facing educators Voss introduced the idea of cognitive load: te amount of mental effort it takes to complete a task.
“When teachers are using [AI] to help with their cognitive loads, that frees them to do more,” he said. “When we’re talking about young students using AI, that is a huge problem. There needs to be a cognitive load for little ones to learn.”
In his consultant work Voss tells teachers to embrace the technology in their own work, and many at Maryville have. They report writing quizzes, discussion prompts, and assignments, as well as proofreading emails with different Language Learning Models. Staff report using Brisk AI, Magic School, Khanmigo, and other start-up platforms aimed at educators and students.
Eventually, Voss imagines teachers will simply prompt computers to turn out customized curricula responding to individual student needs.
“The amazing part would be to get our students learning at a pace faster than what we could imagine because they are being taught in ways that reach them directly,” he said.
As Missouri’s student test scores suffered during the pandemic and have barely stabilized in the intervening years, such a vision may seem distant. But Lynn sees similar possibilities.
“You can write a curriculum unit in 2 minutes,” he reports. “It happens so quickly. And then teachers can do less of the managerial task of writing it and spend more time interacting with students and addressing socio-emotional development.”
“It’s going to change learning for years to come,” Lynn said.
Approaches across the region
In releasing the guidelines, Missouri joins about half of US states. There are no federal guidelines. Luke Cox is the Middle and High School Principal in Clarinda, Iowa. In July 2026, Cox noted, the state will require all teacher training programs to address the technology.
“I think [policymakers] see the writing on the wall that AI is here to stay,” he said, of the new requirement. “I think you might start seeing more from the states — whether that’s Iowa, Missouri, or wherever — in terms of regulations.”
Maryville serves around 1,500 students and Clarinda serves around 1000. But many districts in the rural, agrarian region of northwest Missouri are even smaller.
The Fairfax, MO school sits at the center of town, just east of the bluffs that roll down to the Missouri River. The district has a staff of about 25 teachers and a k-12 student population of 140. Due to its small size, the district is taking a “wait-and-see” approach, said Superintendent Jason McDowell.
“Where a larger district with a larger budget might say: ‘let’s run with something now,' we are going to hold back and see what works and what doesn’t work, and learn from others’ mistakes,” he said.
He isn’t concerned about getting left behind.
“A few years ago,” McDowell said, “there was a big trend of bringing technology and student devices into the classroom: cellphones, tablets. And now we have statutes saying ‘don’t bring those things.’”
“It takes some effort on everybody’s part to figure out if AI is going to be a good tool for the classroom, and we’ll go from there," he said.
The student perspective
If Artificial Intelligence is remaking education, and resetting classrooms, what do students make of the new technology? First years at Northwest Missouri State University were entering 10th grade when OpenAI released ChatGPT in Nov. 2022. KXCV News spoke with some of those students to hear their perspectives.
