Balancing Efficiency, Privacy, and Security: Leveraging AI in K-12 Education

11:00AM | Breakout Session 2 | Leadership Track

Explore the transformative potential of AI in K-12 education while addressing essential privacy and security considerations. This session covers internal risks, such as oversharing due to insufficient policies, and external threats, like attackers using AI to target your organization. Through practical examples and demos, we’ll provide actionable insights on balancing efficiency, privacy, and security for responsible AI deployment in schools.

AI tools like Microsoft’s M365 Copilot and Google Workspace’s Gemini bring transformative potential to K-12 education, offering opportunities to streamline tasks and boost productivity. However, to fully realize these benefits, educational leaders must ensure thoughtful and secure deployment that addresses both internal and external risks. This 50-minute session will guide K-12 leaders through two essential aspects of responsible AI use in schools.

Part 1: Internal Privacy Risks
The first part of the session focuses on internal risks, where we’ll discuss the importance of data-sharing policies to prevent oversharing sensitive information. For instance, Ms. Smith, a teacher who should not have access to her students' discipline records, might unintentionally gain indirect access through AI-enabled summaries or recommendations if proper access rules aren’t in place. Such scenarios underscore the need for intentional policy design to avoid data oversharing and protect student privacy.

Part 2: External Security Threats
In the second part, we’ll explore how attackers leverage AI to target K-12 institutions, posing a growing external risk. Demonstrations will reveal how malicious actors use AI to evade detection and target students and staff with sophisticated tactics. We’ll also discuss how prompt injection attacks can exploit vulnerabilities within AI-driven platforms, potentially turning these tools into vectors for compromise.

By combining internal safeguards with awareness of external threats, educational leaders will leave with actionable steps to balance efficiency, privacy, and security. This session emphasizes the power of AI as a supportive tool for schools, advocating for intentional, well-governed deployment to foster a safe and productive learning environment.