Parents Sue School After Teacher Sends Son to Detention for Using AI

Helicopter parenting in the age of AI.

Technicalities

A Massachusetts teacher gave a student a bad grade and a Saturday detention for using generative AI to complete an assignment — and now, as Gizmodo reports, the student's parents are suing the school on the grounds that he might not get into elite universities as a result.

The unusual lawsuit was filed against the Hingham, Massachusetts public school system by Dale and Jennifer Harris, whose child received a 65 out of 100 for using AI without authorization to complete an AP US History assignment.

The Harris family is arguing that their son was handed a barely-passing grade — 65 is one point above an F — on a technicality, as the Hingham High School handbook doesn't expressly forbid students from using generative AI. The lawsuit also disputes the school's ability to make rules about AI use in its classrooms at all, as the state's education authority has yet to provide official AI guidance.

The parents further claim that generative AI was used only to research the assignment, and not to write it. The lawsuit used some surprisingly strong language, condemning the school and its staff for allegedly engaging in a "pervasive, destructive and merciless path of threats, intimidation and coercion to impact and derail [our son's] future and his exemplary record."

"Generative AI is an emerging landscape and its use is here to stay," the lawsuit reads.

But as Gizmodo notes, the school's handbook does forbid the use of "unauthorized technology" and "unauthorized use or close imitation of the language and thoughts of another author and the representation of them as one's work" to complete assignments.

At its core, the lawsuit isn't really about AI; rather, it appears to be a tale-as-old-as-time clash between helicopter parents and educators in an era backdropped by a competitive college admissions landscape.

Regardless, if the case moves forward in the state's federal district courts, it could stand to be a landmark legal decision in the muddy world of generative AI use in education.

Saturday Detention

The district, for its part, argued in a motion to dismiss the case that the legal action is about nothing more than the family's "dissatisfaction" with what the school considered appropriate disciplinary action.

"This lawsuit is not about the expulsion, or even the suspension, of a high school student," reads the dismissal motion. "Instead, the dispute concerns a student... dissatisfied with a letter grade" and "having to attend a 'Saturday' detention."

The school adds that the 65 percent grade handed down to the student was "relatively lenient" for the "serious infraction" of using AI on an assignment without authorization and that it acted within the confines provided by the school handbook, as well as a separate "AI and Schoolwork" packet that was handed out to students and many parents during the Fall 2023 semester.

More on AI and education: High School Starts Replacing Teachers With AI