No way to use Google Search without AI, Google tells schools

Google has acknowledged that there is no way to use Google Search without using artificial intelligence. The admission came on Tuesday as the tech giant announced a slate of new AI products for classrooms and schools, showing how deeply AI is now entwined with the world's most popular website.

Google said it is giving teachers and schools more ways to limit or restrict the use of those AI tools, and that schools should have control over whether students use AI in the classroom. There is one catch, though: if a school or teacher blocks the use of Google's AI features, students will not be able to use Google Search either.

Company executives wrote in a blogpost: 'After listening to schools, teachers, leading researchers, and policymakers, we are now updating our approach to controls for Gemini, Gemini Notebook, Gemini in Classroom, and Google Search. Access to these products will be entirely off for K-12 student accounts until school administrators explicitly turn them on.'

In a comment to the New York Times, Chris Phillips, Google's vice-president for education, said that there is no Google search without AI. 'Search and AI are deeply integrated,' Phillips said. He told the Times that a school-wide ban on AI would mean students 'will not have access to search, and they'll see a message from their school that indicates it's not available.'

To some, the move reads like a penalty for not implementing Google's AI features. New York City's mayor, Zohran Mamdani, who recently imposed a one-year moratorium on generative AI tools in city schools through the eighth grade, said Google was exploiting its near-total control of online search. 'Google is trying to use its monopoly power to force AI into our public schools,' Mamdani posted on X. 'No corporation should have the power to dictate how we teach our children. Our public schools exist to serve students, not to grow the profit margins of Big Tech.' Lina Khan, former chair of the US Federal Trade Commission, echoed his statement, saying Google was using its monopoly on search to coerce schools into adopting AI.

The ubiquity of Google Search has long made it a critical tool for students, and losing access to it may prove reason enough for schools to opt into the new AI features. Google has also maintained a strong hold on technology in US classrooms for years by offering cheap and free products. From Gmail and Google Docs to Google Classroom and Google Chromebooks, the company's suite of software and hardware products is among the most widely used in schools.

One of the new features Google announced was Guided Learning, an AI study tool that coaches students through the process of problem solving rather than giving them the answer. Google plans to integrate Guided Learning directly into Google Search. 'For example, if a student pastes a complex physics problem or asks for help writing a book report in Search, they'll see prompts to help them think critically and work through the concepts, without going directly to the answer,' the company wrote in the blogpost.

Lila Byock, founder of Schools Beyond Screens, a national coalition of parents and teachers advocating for more student-centred policies on the use of screens in schools, called Google's announcement a 'hostile ultimatum'. 'This kind of bullying has no place in our schools,' Byock said in a statement. 'Educational value – not shareholder value – must determine which products are used by students and regulators must intervene to prevent big tech from exploiting schoolchildren for profit.'