New Collaborative Aims to Tackle Questions About AI in Education

A new initiative from Intentional Futures will facilitate conversation toward thoughtful responses to emerging questions about using artificial intelligence (AI) in education.

The Intentional Futures (iF) AI Education Collaborative will gather education and technology professionals in research, development, and funding. Alison Gazarek, iF’s Principal, Education, says the goal of the collaborative is to find common solutions and guiding principles for the innovative development, guidance, and use of AI in education.

“This is an incredible opportunity, especially at the pace with which AI is developing, to pause and ask how we are using this moment to really ensure we are re-envisioning what teaching and learning could and should be,” she says. “This technology has the potential to revolutionize what’s possible.”

The collaborative originated from the realization that in the many conversations about AI the iF team has had with its partners, they are seeking answers to a similar set of questions. The lack of alignment around ways forward revealed the need for a project that brought together a variety of voices. So iF, an Every Learner Everywhere network partner, is convening groups to consider common questions and to inform procedures and policies.

Beginning in mid-summer 2025, the AI Education Collaborative will convene in online sessions to explore questions such as:

• Are we building AI systems that merely digitize our broken educational models?
• Who benefits from AI in education — students, or the companies that design these systems?
• How do we redistribute intellectual and financial capital from tech developers to the young people we serve?
• What radical educational futures might we create with AI that currently seem impossible?
• How can tech developers and policymakers embrace their responsibility to build ethical systems from the start?

Sharing insight

Although iF works with partners in strategy, education technology, and design, its role in the AI Education Collaborative is convenor and facilitator. It isn’t developing predetermined answers, and it will be up to participants to find common solutions.

“These groups will start investigating some of these questions, to ask whether they’re digitizing what currently exists or innovating for what’s possible,” Gazarek says.

While discussion will begin with small groups, the collaborative also will offer public presentations with panels that bring in insight from educators, funders, developers, and attendees. These will emphasize AI’s potential for education at large, on students, and on those who work with them.

The AI Education Collaborative also will include a quarterly call for additional input from the wider education community.

The result, according to iF’s plans for the project, will be a set of guiding principles for using AI in education and a call to action for implementing them.

Building momentum

Gazarek hopes these efforts represent just one phase of the AI Education Collaborative’s efforts, with no set end to its work. Building on the momentum of the discussions, the initiative could take on additional programs. These might include:

• Hosting convenings centered around key questions
• Producing reports with insights and recommended solutions
• Assembling a community of practice
• Leading new programs or pilots

“There will always be ways to better leverage AI for students,” she says. “Could we leverage a couple of really specific innovative pathways, and then, in a year or two, come back and say, ‘We found a solution for that’? This is the kind of work our partners are asking for.”

Offering guidance

These plans for addressing AI in education build on existing services from iF:

• AI readiness and opportunity assessments: Identifying an organization’s strengths, gaps, and potential use cases for AI
• Mission-aligned AI strategy sprints: Defining a guiding vision, ethical guardrails, and a practical roadmap for adoption
• Future-of-AI briefings and market landscapes: Understanding where the field is headed and how an organization can lead
• Tech-enabled futures: Exploring future potential through demos or user journeys of existing AI and edtech tools that draw on the right vision, investment, or design decisions
• Responsible AI rubrics and frameworks: Developing decision-making tools to guide ethical and impactful AI use

Gazarek, a former teacher herself, says she’s particularly excited about the ideas and guidance the AI Education Collaborative will produce.

“I’m passionate about students and education, and I feel invigorated by what’s possible,” she says. “Instead of asking, ‘What are we reacting to, and how do we adapt?’ we’re asking, ‘What are we developing, and what are we going to create?’”