Teachers union AOb wants national guidelines for the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in class because schools and teachers are largely ignorant about its implications.

Some 23% of people older than 12 have used programmes like ChatGPT, with a peak in users between 18 and 25, recent CBS figures have shown, which may put older teachers at a disadvantage.

According to research by the University of Amsterdam, 74% of youngsters between the ages of 16 and 24 have used generative AI in the past year. But 74% of people aged 25 and over have never tried to generate text or photos with AI, the research showed.

“We are already using AI in classrooms but don’t really know how to handle it as an educational tool,” AOb deputy chairman Jelmer Evers told broadcaster NOS. “There are important risks. Using it in schools normalises it and that means we need to know what influence it has, particularly since we are dealing with youngsters,’ he said.

Not much research has been done on the impact of AI on education but there are indications that CHatGPT is being used to do pupils’ work for them without it being detected by teachers.

Clear guidelines will help to raise awareness,” Evers said. “Some providers are not known for their ethical standards, for example. Would you want sensitive pupil data to end up with them. Or should you choose a different provider?”

Evers said he did not think AI in education is necessarily a bad thing. “But there are currently no frameworks for its use. We took a long time making a guideline banning phones and we can learn from that,” he told the broadcaster.

The union is already working on the guidelines and also wants input from the education ministry.

In a reaction, junior education minister Mariëlle Paul acknowledged  “the fast development of AI can cause concern” but did not say if she accepted or rejected the idea for guidelines.

She said the key to its use lies with teachers who could turn to resources already in place, such as the Dutch AI coalition and the expertise centre for digital literacy.