Krishnan questions DOE on banning gamified apps beyond AI policy
Krishnan asks if DOE will commit to banning gamified apps the way it blocked YouTube, noting these apps existed before AI and may not be caught by the AI moratorium. Giunta says gamified apps are not what DOE envisions but takes it under advisement.
Yeah, thank you.
And, you know, and I think a number of the things we heard today, it sounds.
like you've been thoughtful about, and making it public, putting it on the website, I think would make a lot of students and teachers and families feel more at ease.
I want to go back to the gamified apps for a second.
This is, these are really damaging to our kids, much in the same way that social media could be.
You're always looking for the next dopamine hit, right?
And they take so much of the learning out of these gamified apps.
You've committed to banning YouTube for the younger students, blocking it from their student accounts.
Is that same commitment going to be made for these gamified apps?
We will take it under advisement, but a lot of these are going to end up being subject to either our AI moratorium or perhaps not, you know,
I'm not sure which ones we're talking about, you know, specifically, but I do think we're going to see a very limited use.
I don't, you know, gamified apps is not something that we really want to see in our schools.
That is not really the intentional instructional use of technology that we're envisioning.
Yeah, I will note that before the advent of AI, these sorts of apps existed, right?
So beyond the AI policy, beyond it happening, it happens to be caught up in your AI policy, maybe, and it may not be.
And so it's important to take a look at that and make sure, as I've been saying, what's going in front of our children is actually beneficial to our kids and supported by research.