“The guidance not only prepares students for the digital age but also ensures AI use aligns with the school’s values of faith, compassion, integrity, and service,” noted officials at the private Middletown high school along the eastern border of Warren County.
“It includes policies emphasizing ethics, transparency, and responsible technology use while safeguarding privacy and promoting Catholic values,” said school officials.
Jason Umberg Sr., assistant principal at Fenwick, said: “We are deeply committed to preparing our students for a future shaped by AI while staying rooted in our Catholic identity.”
“This policy is not just a response to technological advances but a proactive step toward forming ethical, informed leaders for tomorrow,” noted Umberg.
The AI policy calls for: “Ethics and Digital Citizenship: Teaching students the importance of AI’s ethical implications and fostering responsible use” along with “Transparency and Accountability: Requiring students to attribute AI contributions in their work to maintain academic integrity.”
The guidelines also dictate a “Values-Driven Approach: Encouraging the use of AI as a tool to develop talents and serve others, reflecting Catholic principles.”
School officials said “through this initiative, Bishop Fenwick High School underscores its dedication to lifelong learning for both students and educators, ensuring that the potential of AI enhances, rather than detracts from, the human experience in education.”
Fenwick, which is part of the region’s 19-county Cincinnati Archdiocese school district, is one of two Catholic high schools in Warren County along with Royalmont Academy in Mason.
Officials at Badin High School in Hamilton - Butler County’s only Catholic high school – said they are planning to install their AI policy soon.
Patrick Keating, principal of Badin, said teachers there have been involved in professional development training.
“We’re testing it and we’ll be in the process of rolling it out for the students in the near future,” said Keating, who added no official date for the policy’s rollout has been determined yet.
Locally and statewide, public schools are also exploring AI policies.
Earlier this year, the Dayton Daily News reported Ohio Lt. Gov. Jon Husted, a leader in many of Ohio’s workforce initiatives, encouraged schools to investigate AI curriculum, weighing the benefits of the new technology along with issues like student privacy, data security and ethics.
“The most important, exciting and challenging moment to AI is that we don’t know what’s possible,” Steve Dackin, director of the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce told the Dayton Daily News in February. “But the more tools we place in the hands of school leaders, educators, families and students, the better positioned we will be to use AI tools thoughtfully and responsibly.”
Reporter Eileen McClory contributed to this story.
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