Clarification: This article has been updated to clarify that ThoughtExchange is an AI-powered engagement platform.
School districts are increasingly relying on artificial intelligence to communicate with the public, whether to brainstorm ideas, translate communications for non-English speakers, or craft the messages that go out to community members, concludes a new report.
The report—produced by the National School Public Relations Association and AI-powered engagement platform ThoughtExchange—found that a little more than 90% of NSPRA’s members are already using AI tools in their communications work. The report surveyed 200 school communication professionals from 37 states.
The problem is many school communication professionals are using AI without clear district policies or training to guide their work. Nearly 7 in 10 report that their districts do not have a formal policy addressing employees’ AI use, and more than 6 in 10 reported receiving no training on the ethical use of the technology, the survey found.
“At NSPRA, we believe that AI can be a powerful support for school communicators, but it cannot replace the strategy, relationships, and human voice that define effective school PR,” said Barbara M. Hunter, the executive director of NSPRA, in the report. “As more districts explore these tools, we advocate for a thoughtful, inclusive approach grounded in ethics, transparency, trust, and clarity.”
The report comes as more districts adopt AI tools and incorporate them into instruction. Less attention has been paid to the opportunities and challenges that the fast-changing technology can bring to other parts of district operations, such as school communications.
How AI is being used in school communications
The most common ways that school communication professionals use AI, according to the report, include:
- Brainstorming ideas
- Crafting content for social media posts
- Generating content for newsletters and articles
- Identifying key themes and summarizing open-ended survey responses
- Translating content to reach non-English-speaking populations
Andrew Robinson, the assistant director of communications for the Arlington school district in Virginia, uses AI tools to craft social media captions and content, as well as alternative text to ensure any images or videos online are accessible for those who are visually impaired. The Arlington district is still in the process of crafting an AI use policy, Robinson said.
“Sometimes, I do feel that social media kind of goes by the wayside because my plate is just so full,” Robinson said. “I saw AI as an opportunity to help alleviate some of that work” and help get more content to the community to “showcase what we’re doing in our school” district on a broader scale.
Meanwhile, Jake Potter, the chief communications officer for the Leavenworth district in Kansas, said he doesn’t use AI tools for writing. Mostly, he uses AI as a “brainstorm partner” to get “the creative juices flowing.” He also uses AI tools to summarize multipage reports from the federal or state governments and compare those with the district’s own analyses to see if there’s anything missing. The Leavenworth district doesn’t have a specific AI policy, but Potter said the technology use agreement, which employees and students need to review and agree to, covers the use of AI.
Kate Crowder, a communications supervisor for the Germantown school district in Tennessee, said she uses AI to help her “triage” her emails, or more effectively figure out which ones to respond to first, and repurpose content into different formats, such as brainstorming ways to turn a blog post into social content or a video. The Germantown district has an AI-use policy in place.
“It’s helping me get deeper into the human side of why we do what we do in the first place, which is to celebrate the amazing things happening in public education, with our students, with our staff, and with our communities,” she said.
Crowder and Potter are also using AI tools to help district staff communicate with educators, parents, and other people in their communities. They have created customized AI tools that know and understand their districts’ strategic plans, handbooks, surveys and reports, academic standards, and other policies and procedures. These tools can then be used by other staff members who are preparing presentations, meeting slides, newsletters, or other communications.
The challenges of using AI in school communications
While many school communications professionals are using AI tools in their work, they worry about the pitfalls of the technology, including: losing authenticity, the tools making errors, becoming over-reliant on the technology, data privacy, and ethical concerns, the report found.
One big challenge is that the majority of school communication professionals say their districts don’t have any formal AI policies (69%) nor have they received training on the ethical use of AI from their districts (64%), according to the report.
District-provided professional development on AI has mostly focused on teachers and how they can use the technology in their work, but other district staff also need that training.
The NSPRA report recommends that districts conduct more training to educate all staff on AI, expand the scope of district AI policies so they address use by more than just teachers and students, and quicken policy development to keep pace with the evolution of AI technology.
It makes sense that districts are focusing on instruction, Robinson said. “But we also need to make sure that the rest of our staff are trained and have the tools and resources they need to use AI effectively, ethically, and in a way that is going to support, not harm, the work that we do.”
