Sept. 22, 2025 Editor, The News-Gazette: After reading your Sept. 17 article about AI policy in schools, I was concerned about educators’ enthusiasm for these tools and belief that we must embrace them or be left behind.
A recent study found a correlation between increased AI use and decreased critical thinking skills (Gerlich, 2025). The impact was strongest among the youngest participants, who were 17-25 years old. Another found that when individuals learn about a topic from AI, they tend to develop shallower knowledge than when they learn through standard web search (Melumad & Yun, 2025).
When we use AI tools, we are providing a tremendous amount of private information about ourselves to the big tech companies. So far, the development and operation of these services has been funded by billions of dollars of venture capital investments. Eventually, those investors are going to want to turn a profit. That profit will be funded by either greatly increased subscription fees, or by exploitation of the data we have provided to these companies. Students should be protected from this invasion of privacy.
It’s also worth considering that AI tools may not be as useful as they seem to be. A study of software developers found that participants randomly assigned to use AI tools on tasks actually took 19% longer to complete them, even though they perceived the tools were speeding them up (Becker et al., 2025).
While we may not be able to ignore these tools, we should keep the risk of their use in mind and take the hype with a grain of salt. BEN WILLIAMS Rockbridge County
