Friday, March 27, 2026

Weekly Digest

On National AI Literacy Day, a Look at the Trump Administration’s Approach to AI in Education

Today is National AI Literacy Day, and as the broadband and digital equity community strives toward universal broadband access, we are also addressing the rapidly developing technologies enabled by connectivity.

We are approaching the one-year anniversary of President Donald Trump signing an Executive Order that cemented his Administration’s priorities for the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in education and the workforce. Part of the Administration’s goals on AI adoption include public-private partnerships to advance AI’s integration into learning at all stages—from early childhood to higher education and beyond to workforce development.

What's the Context?

The Trump Administration has taken note of the AI explosion in recent years and is fully invested in leveraging it, including in education.

In April 2025, the Trump Administration released an Executive Order that created the White House Task Force on Artificial Intelligence Education, a committee of government officials with the responsibility “to promote AI literacy and proficiency among Americans by promoting the appropriate integration of AI into education, providing comprehensive AI training for educators, and fostering early exposure to AI concepts and technology to develop an AI-ready workforce and the next generation of American AI innovators.” 

 

The Task Force is chaired by Michael Kratsios, Director for the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Task Force members also include the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of Labor, the Secretary of Education, the Secretary of Energy, the Director of the National Science Foundation, the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, the Special Advisor for AI and Crypto, the Assistant to the President for Policy, and the Assistant to the President for the Office of the First Lady.

The 52 organizations include those that develop leading AI models and technologies—such as Nvidia, OpenAI, and X—as well as software companies, financial technology firms, education technology (edtech) companies, and nonprofit and trade organizations.

While Code.org is the sole nonprofit on the list, numerous other companies include specific funding for or partnerships with nonprofit organizations. So while nonprofits weren’t directly involved in this announcement, tech and telecommunications companies plan to partner with nonprofit organizations to fulfill their commitments. For example, Deloitte commits to providing pro bono support to nonprofits advancing AI in education and workforce development.

For the Trump Administration, AI literacy is not solely the domain of educators and education; the developers of AI technology are being asked to play a key role. Tech companies seem to intend to exert a heavy influence on how AI literacy efforts play out at the federal and state levels—and the Trump Administration is apparently looking to them for leadership and resources.

What Are the Major Avenues for Support?

The most common strategies for AI development and support in the Administration’s initiative are 1) broadly scaling AI literacy programs, 2) developing AI literacy curricula and training teachers, and 3) enhancing workforce development opportunities. These objectives are consistent with the goals of the Administration’s Executive Order on AI.

1. Reaching Learners and Broad Funding

The most common goal listed by the companies is to reach large swaths of learners with AI products and literacy initiatives.

Nonprofit Code.org listed its commitment to engaging 25 million learners through its Hour of AI initiative, which seeks to demystify AI for students and educators and encourage AI use. IBM also plans to skill 2 million learners by 2028 through IBM's Skillsbuild program.

Less than half of the organizations listed specific funding commitments to get this work done—including Google ($1 billion split across different initiatives), NVIDIA ($25 million), and Meta ($20 million).

A handful of the funding commitments are directly tied to the Presidential AI Challenge. Amazon committed $200,000 in Amazon Web Services (AWS) credits and $1.5 million in cash prizes. Microsoft is also investing $1.25 million in prizes.

While these commitments are substantial, there is not a wealth of information on exactly how all of these companies plan to implement these funding plans. 

2. Curriculum Development and Teacher Training

The majority of companies have committed to either developing or supporting AI literacy curricula and the teachers that implement them.

Intel’s AI for Youth Program plans to provide learning resources for grades 3-12, teaching technical skills like generative AI and machine learning alongside critical competencies in AI ethics and responsible innovation. Zoom is committed to supporting nonprofits and institutions that design and deliver K-12 programs centered on AI literacy, curriculum development, and skill-building for educators and students, though it does not specify what that support will look like (e.g., funding).

AT&T’s commitment is to expand offerings on its digital learning platform, Achievery, and to provide accessible, engaging AI curriculum and tools to more than 1.3 million students, caregivers, and educators by 2030.

MagicSchool, a leading educational technology company, is committed to ensuring all educators in the U.S. have free access to its AI tools. The company is also committed to offering customized AI training workshops for school districts depending on their needs.

While developing a curriculum is essential, companies have prioritized reaching teachers first, as they ultimately implement curricula and introduce AI-driven technologies to their students.

Research from the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) suggests that AI-driven classroom tools can save teachers time, allowing them to interact more directly with students and to improve teaching methods generally. However, teachers report new challenges arising from AI use, such as the added burden of checking students’ work for originality. Half of students, many of whom use AI tools themselves, feel disconnected from teachers who use AI tools in the classroom, but would also rather work with AI than with a teacher when they don’t understand something. And parents have their own feelings, expressing distrust of teachers who use AI, and wishing to have the option to opt out of AI tool usage entirely.

Teachers are navigating a very complex environment and having to change their instructional practices accordingly. To add more to the challenge, AI developers are competing to get their products into schools, rolling out larger and larger initiatives to do so.

Google has been at the forefront of this task for years. The company has its Gemini AI platform integrated into more than 1,000 U.S. higher education institutions and a $1 billion commitment to AI training programs through 2028, which it included in the White House press release.

The primary model of teacher support for tech companies is to offer a course on AI basics, which then onboards teachers onto the companies’ own platforms. Google’s teacher-specific resources offer teachers the basics of using AI, specifically Google Gemini. Anthropic’s AI Fluency for educators resources work similarly: they introduce AI platforms and safety, then AI use for educators through its own platform, Claude.

Apple, Meta and Microsoft made similar commitments. Apple is partnering with Common Sense Media to develop a curriculum about responsible AI usage. The Teachers’ Essentials Guide to Fundamentals with Apple was created in November 2025 as part of this commitment. The guide’s goals are to help teachers navigate AI use in their classrooms and “maintain agency as educators,” while showing them how to use Apple’s AI tools in their work.

Ultimately, companies primarily market their tools as methods for educational optimization in the classroom and as professional development opportunities for teachers.

3. Workforce Development and Apprenticeships

For the companies, supporting learners’ use of AI to find and access new jobs is a high priority.

At the high school level, companies are interested in creating career pathways into STEM fields using AI technologies. The Business Software Alliance (BSA), a trade association whose membership includes many of the organizations mentioned by the White House, vows to expand its work with Girls Who Code, an organization that introduces women and non-binary folks to STEM career opportunities. 

Companies like Adobe and Kyndryl are developing apprenticeship opportunities for high school and college students to build on their education. Adobe plans to develop a scalable public-private partnership model for high-skilled, tech and AI-fluent apprenticeships to support the Trump Administration’s goal of one million new apprenticeships. Kyndryl pledged, through its Kyndryl Foundation, to support an 18-week apprenticeship-style workforce program for high school students. The program will focus on emerging technologies and AI, with a goal to reach 1,500 participants.

A few companies emphasized partnerships with community colleges as a successful avenue to support adult learners. Microsoft announced a partnership with the American Association of Community Colleges to offer no-cost AI certifications to community college faculty and students in order to support job seekers. Intel is aiming to expand AI programming to 130 community colleges, targeting specific industries such as agriculture, manufacturing, and cybersecurity, plus cross-industry skills in sustainability, accessibility, and applied ethics.

Other companies want to address how AI has changed the current workforce and support individuals through the resulting career shifts. Silver Lake and Zoom are committed to investing in workforce development organizations that retrain workers affected by AI-driven job shifts and provide upskilling opportunities for AI-relevant roles. 

How Are These Initiatives Going?

Many of these commitments existed before the White House’s announcement. Some companies built upon commitments already made, while others sought this opportunity to simply highlight the work they’re doing. It’s unlikely we will see significant updates about many of these initiatives.

Through its announcement, the Trump Administration recognized a select few participants in the ongoing conversation about AI’s role in the U.S. education system. A number of these organizations have collaborated on AI-in-education initiatives since the White House’s announcement:

• OpenAI launched a host of certification courses in partnership with Coursera, designed to provide workers with hands-on training in using AI tools. This includes AI Foundations for Teachers, which aims to help educators use AI safely and confidently as they integrate ChatGPT into their teaching methods.
• Amazon partnered with edtech company Playlab to bring custom AI tools to 18 different educational organizations and 500,000 students. The company has invested $800,000 in this project thus far, and it ties into its commitments through the Presidential AI Challenge.
• Anthropic and the nonprofit Teach For All partnered to bring Claude to educators in 63 countries worldwide. Anthropic provides teachers with AI literacy basics and Claude, and teachers in turn inform Anthropic about how they use the product, further shaping its design.
• xAI announced a partnership with the government of El Salvador to implement a nationwide AI-powered education program. xAI will deploy Grok in more than 5,000 public schools nationwide, developing curricula and strategies to expand this approach to more nations worldwide.

Shaping the Ecosystem of AI Learning

Among the companies in the White House’s announcement, a couple expressed interest in shaping the broader AI ecosystem in education. For them, this primarily entails coordinating the development of AI literacy standards or enabling learners to access AI while acknowledging the digital divide.

Standards Development

Present amongst a small group of companies in the White House’s announcement was an emphasis on establishing standards for AI in education and advocating for proposed legislation.

The Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) is committed to continuing its efforts to establish principles for the use of AI in education. In 2023, SIIA released the “Education Technology Industry’s Principles for the Future of AI in Education,” an organization-wide framework for implementing AI technologies in a purpose-driven, transparent, and equitable manner, while ensuring that AI does not replace educators or the learning experience. The principles include ensuring AI use is done equitably and inclusively, protecting student privacy, addressing the needs of learners, and striving for transparency. 

Cengage, a member of SIIA, is committed to maintaining these standards, as well as developing further best practices for transparency disclosures on AI tools in classrooms with a new member working group and input from the education community.

Code.org advocated for standards at the state and federal levels. The company is committed to partnering with 25 states during the next three years to build and promote AI pathways and AI standards. Code.org also advocated for the National Science Foundation (NSF) AI Education Act, a version of which was introduced in 2024 by Representative Vince Fong (R-CA), in 2025 (also by Rep. Fong), and in 2026 by Senators Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Jerry Moran (R-KS).

The NSF AI Education Act—as of the 2026 Senate version—would require NSF to create publicly available education guidance for using AI in classrooms, with a focus on tools for K-12, low-income, rural, and tribal students. The proposed legislation would also task NSF with boosting AI workforce development, expanding educational opportunities through community colleges, and advancing agricultural development using AI tools.

The Digital Divide as a Roadblock to AI Adoption

Students grappling with the digital divide still face the same challenges, regardless of the AI tools introduced into their classrooms as that technology develops. It’s no surprise that some of these companies addressed more than just AI adoption in their commitments—without internet access or affordable devices, their efforts to introduce digital education tools are ineffective.

AT&T is committed to expanding its Connected Learning Centers, which are housed in local nonprofits across the country and provide free resources for students and families, including high-speed internet, computers, tutoring, and mentoring. The company plans to open 100 learning centers by 2027 in tandem with its AI adoption goals.

HP is also providing devices to support AI literacy and use by offering its ZBooks and workstations to K-12 students.

AT&T and HP’s commitments seem to recognize that AI literacy efforts are not exempt from the persistent digital divide—and that lopsided AI adoption may only exacerbate the harms to those without high-speed internet access and the devices to use it.

Policy Takeaways as AI Education Unfolds

Since the 2025 Executive Order that launched the Trump Administration’s AI education priorities, the dialogue around advancing those priorities has followed the same path: the federal government invites the private sector to play an influential role in shaping the discourse and practice of AI literacy. The commitments shown in the White House announcement emphasize who is being listened to in the conversation around educational technology, and who may have the most influence moving forward.

The release also shows that new opportunities are being afforded to come of the companies listed, who may not have previously had a voice in the edtech climate, like publishers and trade associations. But across the board, all of these companies’ public-private commitments seem to blur the line between social responsibility and finding new customers for their products in the education market.

All of the statements from companies in the space and federal initiatives in the past year are reflected in the Trump Administration’s National Policy Framework on AI, released just last week. The framework’s priorities are:

1. Protecting Children and Empowering Parents
2. Safeguarding and Strengthening American Communities
3. Respecting Intellectual Property Rights and Supporting Creators
4. Preventing Censorship and Protecting Free Speech
5. Enabling Innovation and Ensuring American AI Dominance
6. Educating Americans and Developing an AI-Ready Workforce
7. Establishing a Federal Policy Framework, Preempting Cumbersome State AI Laws

The policy framework is brief and very light-touch; its overlap with AI in education lies mostly in the sixth objective. Here, the Administration directs Congress to use “non-regulatory methods” to ensure that existing education programs and workforce training and support programs, including apprenticeships, affirmatively incorporate AI training. So, the Administration is further supporting public-private partnerships that encourage AI adoption, such as those highlighted here, while thoroughly discouraging significant legislative action by Congress. 

The policy framework reiterates the Administration’s stance on barring states from implementing their current AI policies or introducing new ones. The framework advocates for a federal AI policy framework and the prevention of a “fragmented patchwork of state regulations.” While companies included in the White House education commitments would agree that federal standards and guidance are needed, not all take this approach. Anthropic, for example, publicly disagrees with the Administration’s attempts to establish a ten-year moratorium on state AI laws, attempts which have so far been unsuccessful.

Overall, broadband and digital equity community members will be watching to see how AI literacy efforts play out, with the influence of private companies, a new federal framework, and initiatives that vary from school district to school district all at play.

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Notes

1. The Mason Contractors Association plans to increase the use of its AI-powered Wall Evaluator software, which helps assess vocational students’ progress on construction projects. 

Kevin Taglang
Executive Editor, Communications-related Headlines
Benton Institute
for Broadband & Society
1041 Ridge Rd, Unit 214
Wilmette, IL 60091
847-220-4531
headlines AT benton DOT org