AI in Education: A Grey Issue

I am someone who loves nuance. I enjoy seeing both sides of an issue, learning from multiple perspectives, and sitting with ideas rather than rushing to conclusions. I’m especially drawn to topics that don’t have a clear right or wrong answer, which is why AI has been such an interesting focus over the past couple of weeks.

There are many positives to AI. The lesson planning we’ve been doing has certainly become more efficient with its use. Even learning how to generate effective prompts and then editing the results still takes far less time than writing a lesson plan entirely from scratch. Because AI harnesses such a vast amount of collective knowledge, it can feel, in some ways, like the ultimate teacher. It can fill in gaps and provide support that was once limited to those who could afford tutors, editors, or extra academic help. As a student, I feel a constant tension between seeing AI everywhere and being curious about its possibilities, while also being told not to use it.

At the same time, there are so many serious considerations. The environmental impact of AI, the corporate mining of people’s art and writing, AI “hallucinations,” and the potential deterioration of research and critical thinking skills through overuse all raise red flags. These are not minor drawbacks; they fundamentally challenge how and why we use these tools.

I’m still undecided about how AI should be used and taught in schools. On one hand, keeping AI out of classrooms means students won’t learn how it works, what its risks are, or where its limitations lie. On the other hand, allowing AI use—especially too early or without strong boundaries—may hinder the development of students’ skills that are still forming. This tension feels unresolved, and I’m not sure there is a perfect solution.

For a more in-depth overview of the advantages and disadvantages of AI in education, this article from University Canada West offers a useful breakdown:
https://www.ucanwest.ca/blog/education-careers-tips/advantages-and-disadvantages-of-ai-in-education

Even setting aside many of these pros and cons, the environmental cost alone feels like it should give us pause. An article from MIT explores this issue in depth, noting that “[e]ach time a model is used, perhaps by an individual asking ChatGPT to summarize an email, the computing hardware that performs those operations consumes energy. Researchers have estimated that a ChatGPT query consumes about five times more electricity than a simple web search.” (https://news.mit.edu/2025/explained-generative-ai-environmental-impact-0117). Another article points out that “the top 20 AI systems they included in their study consumed enough energy to rival a small country… In fact, in 2022, the carbon emissions from these AI systems surpassed the emissions emitted by 137 individual countries.” (https://www.advancedsciencenews.com/calculating-the-true-environmental-costs-of-ai/).

This brings me to a question I’m still grappling with: how do we reconcile the use of AI with the First Peoples’ Principles of Learning, particularly the first principle: Learning ultimately supports the well-being of the self, the family, the community, the land, the spirits, and the ancestors. If learning is meant to be relational, responsible, and grounded in care for the land, can AI truly fit within that framework? Or does its cost, especially environmentally, undermine the very values education is meant to uphold?