On February 24th, the House Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education convened a hearing titled Building an AI-Ready America: Teaching in the Age of Artificial Intelligence (AI). The hearing brought together educators, nonprofit leaders, and the private sector to examine how AI is already reshaping classrooms and to discuss steps Congress should take to ensure schools, teachers, and students are not left behind. Across testimonies, the consensus was clear: it is imperative for safe guardrails, ethical training, and AI literacy to be built into adoption from the start.
The hearing featured four witnesses: Michele Blatt, State Superintendent of Schools at the West Virginia Department of Education; Aneesh Sohoni, CEO of Teach for America; David Slykhuis, PhD, Dean of the Dewar College of Education and Human Services at Valdosta State University; and Allyson Knox, Senior Director of Education and Workforce Policy at Microsoft.
Witnesses raised a pressing concern: teachers currently have no clear guidance on how to respond to unethical AI use. Without clear school or district-level policies, educators must navigate academic integrity issues alone. David Slykhuis and Michele Blatt both argued that intentional, guidance-driven implementation—rather than reactive bans—offers the most effective path forward. Blatt pushed back against overly restricting student access to AI tools, contending that AI fluency will soon define workforce readiness.
All four witnesses agreed that addressing AI’s impact on student achievement will require coordinated federal investment that does not yet exist at the necessary scale. The administration’s efforts to dismantle the Department of Education significantly heighten this concern. Without that coordination and investment, schools in under-resourced communities risk falling further behind, potentially deepening existing gaps in learning and workforce preparedness. Aneesh Sohoni stressed that AI, if deployed incorrectly, carries a real risk of diminishing critical thinking rather than enhancing it, an outcome that would disproportionately harm already disadvantaged students.
Several witnesses cautioned that rushing AI adoption without intentionality and safety guardrails risks repeating the harms caused by social media usage—particularly the rise in youth anxiety. The witnesses called for a deliberate approach and suggested equipping teachers with professional development on how to teach both about and with AI. Allyson Knox highlighted Microsoft’s National Academy for AI Instruction, a model which aims to train 400,000 teachers over five years.
Behavioral and brain scientists have a central role to play in understanding how students process and interact with AI tools, how to best support teachers in building AI literacy, and how policymakers can design guardrails grounded in the science of learning and development. FABBS will continue to advocate for federal investment in this research and for policies that keep the human element at the center of AI’s role in education.
