Fresh off their being erroneously awarded a Connecticut Association of Boards of Education “Board Leadership Award” (engineered by HPS Board Member A.J. Johnson, who sits on the CABE Board of Directors), the Hartford Schools Board of Education adopted a policy at their Regular Meeting which they never questioned, discussed, and probably never read.

As BOE Chair Phillip Rigueur explained in condescending tone to Board Member Shonta Browdy, the BOE’s policy adoption process includes members of the Policy Committee (PC, for short…of course) agreeing on the “spirit” and “language” of a policy, after which it is “brought forth” to the Regular Meeting for adoption.

One can assume then that the BOE’s policy on Artificial Intelligence (AI), on the November Regular Meeting’s agenda for adoption, received the sort of vetting that Board Member Escribano holds dear (“The Board of One”), thus garnering the PC’s approval of its “spirit” and “language.” 

Sounds good to me, said the blind man.  However, after appearing on the agendas of three different board meetings (Oct. 2 Policy Meeting, Oct. 17 Regular Meeting, and Nov. 6 Policy Meeting), there was zero questions from board members, zero discussion from board members, but 4 minutes of Chief Performance Officer Bethany Silver introducing the policy at the  Oct. 2 Policy Meeting.  While it is a practice but not a policy of the district to not allow a student to be graded with anything below a 50, the BOE is also quite content in allowing their AI policy to pass to the next level despite receiving zeros across the board.  This BOE policy process and HPS’ graduation process are in alignment, which I’m sure the Superintendent’s District Model of Excellence calls for.

During last week’s Regular Meeting, Browdy wanted to know why the Hartford City Council recently adopted a resolution codifying their support for what will most likely be a most excellent adventure into AI by HPS.  Totally missing her point, Rigueur, because he went to MIT (he brought this up, not me), felt that he was obliged and qualified to speak on AI to answer Browdy’s question.  He spoke about AI in terms of what any high school STEM student could; that it was new, it has issues, but is growing and evolving; but he never answered Ms. Browdy’s question.  It costs about $80,000 in tuition for four years at MIT.

Superintendent Torres-Rodriguez basically dismissed the city council action on AI in Hartford schools by saying it “wasn’t much of a conversation” (except for Hartford News columnist Anne Goshdigian), “was more of a general interest” conversation, and the “resolution had several bullet” points. 

If you read the city council resolution, you will realize that the Superintendent downplayed a city resolution which mandates that the district provide to the council semi-annual “qualitative and quantitative data” updates regarding the integration of AI into educational programs.  But, eh, why involve the BOE with all this reporting detail, which, if you look back through the Hartford Schools Report Archives, you will realize that this is the BOE way, to remain comfortably numb.

So, based on a 4-minute introduction of the policy by a member of Central Office to board members at a committee meeting, and a nearly 2-minute answering of a question by an MIT graduate (who referred to “ChatGPT” as “ChatGT”, which, by the way, is currently blocked on the district netwok), while never really answering the question, the BOE felt the spirit of AI in the room and the language of the policy document which they never discussed was perfect and it was a unanimous vote for adoption.

The ‘list it and adopt it’ process which the district’s newly approved Generative AI Policy endured, actually a model AI policy provided by the folks from CABE, stands in sharp contrast to the equity policy currently having its ‘I’s’ dotted and its ‘T’s’ crossed by the BOE’s PC committee (wink).

The board’s equity policy has been through more meetings than the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.  Board Member and PC Chair A.J. Johnson said that the policy has been through so many meetings because they wanted to “make sure they got it right.”  Johnson stated that the equity policy was shared with the community numerous times to “ensure” stakeholder “voice” and “feedback.”  Johnson said this policy is “really, really, big…it may set a precedent…it is Hartford leading the way” (actually, HPS is about 4 years late to the equity policy game, but let’s not burst Johnson’s PC bubble).

Based on this, which policy has been adopted and which has not?  Yes, the policy absent any conversation, discussion, or stakeholder involvement, while the policy which has involved more board time than a Shonta Browdy question, is still a work-in-progress.  Future HPS boards will look at the district’s AI policy and exclaim, this was surely not crafted by anyone from MIT!