New York City will bar student use of generative artificial intelligence from 2-K through eighth grade for the 2026–27 school year, Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels announced on September 2.
City officials said the one-year moratorium affects nearly 600,000 public school students, about two-thirds of enrollment. Reuters and CNN described it as the most restrictive student-facing AI policy yet adopted by a major U.S. district. The city said it will discontinue or disable AI components in more than 38 previously allowed programs that do not meet new safety and oversight standards. Companion chatbots and consumer tools such as ChatGPT and Claude will be blocked for all grades.
Mamdani said children “need teachers and human connections in order to learn and grow” and that the district would spend the year studying the technology’s effects rather than treating early AI use as inevitable. High school students will receive twice-yearly AI literacy lessons and may use AI in limited, approved cases. Teachers may still use AI for lesson planning and administrative work that meets city standards. A small high-school pilot will test vetted tools.
The policy also sets screen-time limits on individual devices, including recommended caps of 30 minutes a day for grades 3–5 and 45 minutes for middle school, with tighter limits for the youngest students. Exceptions were described for students with disabilities and English learners.
SOURCES: NYC Mayor’s Office, Reuters, CNN, Politico, The Verge, ABC7 New York.
