Pasco County Schools embracing AI in the classroom
PASCO COUNTY, Fla. - Artificial intelligence is being incorporated into nearly every industry, from medicine to farming and now teaching.
Pasco County Schools is one of the few districts choosing to embrace AI in the classroom, starting this year.
Joanne Glenn, the principal at Angeline Academy of Innovation, feels that it's their job to best prepare kids for college and careers.
She says she can't do that by protecting them from innovation and development, so instead, they're immersing kids into artificial intelligence and teaching them how to responsibly use AI tools.
"The overall goal is that our kids are able to solve problems," Glenn said.
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It opens Thursday to grades six through 10. Beginning in ninth grade, students choose one of four subjects to specialize in.
The subjects include Cybersecurity, Biomedical Engineering, Robotics or Artificial Intelligence.
"They will learn the technical aspects of artificial intelligence engines, prompt engineering and that sort of thing. And embedded in that course of study is the ethics of using these tools," Glenn said.
Unlike Angeline Academy, some local school districts and universities have banned artificial intelligence on campus. In a world of innovation, Glenn felt that wasn't the right move.
"All that artificial intelligence is taking data and analyzing patterns and making predictions based on that. So the real power of artificial intelligence is learning how to better write prompts that cue programs to search for relevant data and then funnel that back in a useful, actionable way for people," Glenn said.
Once students finish their sophomore year, they transition from less time in the classroom to more on-the-job real-world work experience through internships facilitated between the school and local businesses.
"They actually are building a resume of things that they know and have successfully done in a workplace context," Glenn said.