When SBHS junior Jacob Friend heard about the new AI course offered at his high school, he was intrigued – not because he thought he could use it to do all of his schoolwork, but because he wanted to learn how AI worked. In the course, hands-on activities replace long lectures, as students learn how to have conversations with chatbots and how to use AI ethically. 

“Understanding how computers work and how cyberspace works has inspired me to go into cyber security and this would be a good course to take for that,” said Friend. 

Friend is one of the many students enrolled in the Artificial Intelligence in the World and AI foundations, one of the first classes that teaches students how to use AI. SBHS is one of hundreds of South Florida schools that have partnered with technology companies in an initial roll out of AI courses. 

A New York Times article published by Natasha Singer How Miami schools are leading 100,000 students into the AI future, reported that schools across South Florida are launching AI courses on tools like Microsoft Copilot and Google Gemini into school settings.

As South Broward high school’s AI liaison and instructor, Ryan Perez teaches the AI certification course that focuses on educating students about AI, how to understand and operate it. His classes focus on hands-on experience with large language models, machine learning and ethical AI use. He also explained that students not only learn how AI functions but also experiment with its full capabilities. 

“We’re learning Microsoft Azure AI fundamentals. It’s the back end of AI. It’s what’s a large language model, how do machines learn, what is the difference between intelligence and actually knowing things,” said Perez. “It’s quite nuanced.”

Artificial intelligence has already been incorporated into courses such as personal finance and history through many assignments that encourage students to think critically. SBHS student Wendi Servin thinks it’s important to understand how AI can help students understand things better. 

“For me, AI is important because it teaches us how we’re progressing in life and the benefits it can bring to our daily lives, making things easier and improving our ability to do them,” said Servin. “I think this has led to AI being present almost everywhere now, which encourages us to learn how it works and where it comes from, and has also been incredibly helpful to many companies.

Perez said that many of his students are often asked to test and expand on the limits of AI by comparing the similarities and differences between human and AI generated questions.

“For example, we have one assignment right now where students have to come up with questions and they have to test each other to determine whether if those are human generated or robot generated or in this case, AI generated. And then they have to test those same questions on the AI, and they have to compare the differences,” said Perez. 

Administrators and teachers at South Broward are also learning to integrate the use of AI in education. Twelfth grade Assistant Principal Darryl Baker explained that AI can be used for planning and scheduling a major advantage for many students and teachers. But he cautioned that they had to be mindful of the pitfalls of using AI. 

“From a teacher’s standpoint it can be helpful when it comes to planning and organization,” Baker said. “From a student standpoint, I mean you have the world at your fingertips. You just have to be cautious about making AI do everything for you because then it kind of diminishes the learning process.”

South Broward’s Principal Alexander Francois noted that AI can be a positive tool for students when used in the proper way. He believes that AI can help teachers create lesson plans tailored to specific students and support struggling learners. 

“I like the idea and use of AI when it’s used the right way, not just for cheating, but just helping students and teachers develop lessons and tools to study to be able to grasp materials,” Francois said. “For example, I know many softwares allow teachers to just say “Hey, I need a revised lesson to help assist struggling readers.” AI can help formulate that lesson to help our students. So, when you use it the correct way, I think it can be a definite positive resource for education.”

To take a step into this new change, SBHS and the school district have provided training sessions on how to use AI tools such as Microsoft Copilot. Francois explained that these sessions help teachers understand the basic use of AI and improve lessons rather than replace traditional teachings. 

“Last year, Mr. Rodriguez Perez held a training session and showed teachers some of the tools that we have at our disposal,” Francois said. “And then coming into this year, I know the district is pushing Copilot, so I know Copilot would be one of the tools the district uses.”

Although many of the administrative team sees the benefits of AI in education, many students remain cautious about the reliability of AI. Twelfth grade student Emma-Teresa Hernandez shared her concerns about the use of AI in education. She believes that the use of AI in education defeats the whole purpose of brain power and thinking. She even expressed her worry about AI spreading personnel information through third party websites, as well as its increasing use by students for shortcuts.

“There are pros and cons of having AI in education because many people manipulate AI or use it for the wrong reasons,” Hernandez said. “It defeats the purpose of brain power and thinking. It can help with vocabulary and definition, but that’s a brain muscle we’re supposed to have due to school and the teaching we get from those at school.” 

Friend agrees that students need to be cautious with how they use AI. He points to the fact that a lot of people use AI unethically and several deaths have been attributed to AI use. 

“It is breaking its own safeguards or telling someone to overdose is one of the most recent incidents of AI being dangerous,” said Friend. “They are not taking safety precautions or ethical precautions while AI can often spread or self-replicate, so it provides danger like that and they are adding these AI’s to government systems or militaries which could be taking human lives or creating various dangerous conditions for humans.” 

While lack of regulation is a key concern SBHS along with many other South Florida public schools are pushing to integrate AI into education. Perez thinks it’s important to embrace AI as a tool for learning instead of something to fear. He points to the example of Alpha School Palm Beach. 

“In West Palm Beach, a private school that has three to four hours of AI teachings and then the rest of the day is social interaction. Learning how to be a good human.” Perez said. “Like how to do soft skills. How to do everyday skills that people need to know. So if more schools embrace that the ideology of AI is your friend and not your foe, then maybe, we could change education altogether.”