North Carolina teachers are navigating a patchwork of district-level AI policies, with most school boards adopting only brief statements that commit to teaching AI literacy and treating misuse like plagiarism - without explaining how either will work in practice, a WRAL News review found. Wake County, home to the state's largest school district, has no AI policy yet, though district leaders expect one by late fall.
The state's Department of Public Instruction has issued detailed guidance, updated periodically since January 2024, but it remains advisory. That leaves individual teachers to decide how - or whether - to incorporate AI into their classrooms.
Teachers split on approach
Some educators have responded by pulling technology out of their classrooms entirely. Hayden Stephens, a third-year teacher at Broughton High School in Raleigh, requires all work to be completed on paper, in class, so she can watch students' progress unfold.
"I just don't think that students learn if they're copying answers from AI or if they're uploading their assignments and AI spits back answers," Stephens said. "So we're strictly pen and paper in my classroom. Everything that they do is on paper."
Stephens stopped assigning homework after concluding students were feeding problems into AI and copying the results. Since moving to in-class work, she said she has noticed students grasping the material better and showing more critical thinking.
Other teachers are taking a middle path. Karyn Wilson, a librarian at Green Hope High School in Cary, teaches students how to use AI ethically - creating bibliographies, brainstorming research keywords, and checking sources - while advising teachers on how to incorporate AI into assignments without doing the work for students.
"School is kind of the perfect place to learn how - before they go off into the real world," Wilson said. "It would be doing our students a disservice not to at least bring it up with them."
Policy gaps leave teachers guessing
Most district policies in the Triangle region are nearly identical: two paragraphs that mention AI literacy and equate AI misuse with plagiarism, according to the WRAL review. They don't detail how teachers should enforce rules or teach the technology.
Wake County's internal guidance, which district leaders hope to formalize into a policy this fall, tells teachers not to rely on AI detection tools - a stance echoed by state guidance. The State Board of Education plans to adopt AI literacy standards in coming years, with input from researchers, and school boards will be required to adopt their own policies.
Teachers say they need more concrete direction. Stephens noted that a uniform approach across subjects would be difficult, but some structure is necessary.
"AI literacy is important," she said. "It's not going anywhere. It's only going to get bigger and better."
Wilson said students often overestimate what AI can do. "With a lot of people I interact with, there's this belief that AI is an all-knowing engine, when that's just not how it works," she said.
For educators seeking practical training on classroom AI use, AI for Teachers Courses offers structured guidance on integrating the technology responsibly. Broader coverage of how AI is reshaping schools is available under AI for Education.
Why this matters for educators
The absence of clear district policies means teachers are making consequential decisions alone: whether to ban AI outright, teach it as a tool, or find some middle ground. That inconsistency creates uneven student experiences across classrooms and schools. Teachers should document what works in their own classrooms and push their school boards for specific guidance on enforcement and literacy instruction - before the state's new standards arrive and turn today's voluntary choices into required practice.
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