Teachers in Montgomery County are building their own rules for artificial intelligence in the classroom, creating a patchwork of policies while school districts and the state race to catch up. The Montgomery County Board of Education approved an amended technology policy in May 2026, and the Maryland Artificial Intelligence Ready Schools Act took effect in June, but in many schools, individual educators still decide whether students can use tools like ChatGPT or Claude.
"It is the Wild West," said Kevin Shindel, a social studies teacher at Montgomery Blair High School who retired at the end of the 2025-2026 school year. Shindel encouraged students to form an AI committee and permitted limited uses such as creating flash cards, but gave zeros on assignments clearly written by AI. He distinguished between "AI fluency"-showing teachers and students how to use AI-and "AI literacy"-analyzing AI's impact on education and society. "We need to promote AI literacy," he said, likening it to the push for media literacy in past decades.
A fractured landscape of classroom rules
Michael Schweizer, head of the science department at Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda, has been exploring Google's Gemini through his school account. He used AI to design a physics lab where students studied electrical resistivity with Play-Doh, and invited chemistry students to generate images of element-based "superheroes." To head off cheating, he now gives more paper-and-pencil exams than he has in years.
"I am closer to gung-ho than I am to reserved," Schweizer said. Still, he noted that no countywide directive has arrived. "There's been no direct initiative from the county to use AI. I don't think from our end there's people waiting for the cavalry, because it's not coming."
The county's new policy states that AI tools "are intended to support, rather than replace, active, teacher-led instruction" and directs MCPS to implement a formal vetting process for emerging technologies. Liliana Lopez, a public information officer for MCPS, said regulations would be in place by mid to late September 2026. The state law requires AI literacy to become part of K-12 workforce preparation and computer science standards by June 2027.
Students push for voice in the rules
At Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School, English teacher David Lopilato gathered two dozen juniors and seniors in April to discuss their experiences. The students described a reality where "to ChatGPT it" is now a verb, and where some peers misuse AI to write papers. But many said they consciously limit their own use.
"I'm kind of opposed to the use of AI because I feel like it takes away from people thinking for themselves," said Shoronya Majumder, now a senior. "I do use it to create prompts or study guides, but not to think for me." Simone Pulerwitz-Waisbord, who graduated in June, said students need instruction: "It doesn't make sense for us to have access to this tool which severely impacts our educational experience if we're, one, not taught how to use it and, two, can just use it whenever we want without any instructions or guidelines."
Assistive technology and parental pushback
Cally Kammerer, a senior at Connelly School of the Holy Child in Potomac, uses AI to take notes because of learning challenges that make reading harder. "When I started using AI, it just completely changed my life," she said. Her mother, Holly Kammerer, argued that for neurodivergent students, "it's not cheating. It's leveling the playing field." The family worked with Del. Aaron Kaufman's office to support guaranteed AI access in individual education plans, but no bill was introduced. They plan to push for legislation again next year.
Other parents remain wary. In January, the Montgomery County Council of PTAs passed a resolution urging schools to block generative AI tools on student devices until their benefits are proven. "The foundation of learning is mental struggle, and the purpose of AI is to remove that struggle," said Betsy Tao, chair of the council's technology committee. A coalition of advocacy groups launched a petition in July calling for a suspension of student-facing AI apps such as Google Gemini.
One school's model: students as co-architects
Holton-Arms School in Bethesda took a different path. After a faculty survey more than two years ago showed 50% of teachers were using AI but over 80% had no formal training, the school enlisted students from its AI Innovators Club to help educate staff. Directors of Technology Integration Lucia Hassell-Lee and Troy Gordon developed "AI Tastings"-sessions where students and teachers explore tools like MagicSchool, Brisk, and NotebookLM together.
"What happens when you partner with students to become co-architects of their own learning environment?" Hassell-Lee said. "What we've seen is just magical things." The school's principles include treating AI as a "sparring partner," never a crutch, and following a "human first, human last" rule-the human sets parameters and supervises the result. Grace Xiao, a co-founder of the AI Innovators Club who graduated in May, said, "We don't always believe AI is good. But also we know that there are positives as well."
Why this matters for educators
The Montgomery County experience shows that AI policy is being shaped from the ground up, often by individual teachers making judgment calls with little formal guidance. For educators, the immediate challenge is not waiting for district mandates but developing clear classroom-level protocols-defining when AI assists learning and when it replaces the mental struggle that builds skill. The Holton-Arms model suggests that involving students in creating those norms can produce more durable buy-in than top-down rules. Teachers looking to build their own AI literacy can find structured training through AI for Teachers Courses or explore learning paths designed specifically for AI Secondary Education Courses.
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