Education Week - May 29, 2024 - 5

WHAT THE
RESEARCH SAYS
clips. They fear that the technology
will progress to a point where it will
be difficult to distinguish between
real and fake.
The relative ease with which Darien
faked the audio has principals thinking
closely about how they communicate
with their staff, students, and the
parent community.
For one thing, it doesn't take a lot of
data for an AI tool to be able to replicate
a voice from an audio clip.
" I have a colleague who sends out a
voice message to her student community.
I told her she should stop that, "
said Melissa Shindel, the principal of
Glenwood Middle School in Glenwood,
Md. " It could need less than a
two-minute audio clip. And you can't
always trace the origin. "
Shindel said she's been cautioning
other school leaders about their unbridled
support of AI in their schools.
" People are in denial about the
harm it could do, " she said. " Deepfakes
are more damaging than negative
social media posts. You believe
what you see or hear, over what you
read. "
A troubling notion, exemplified in
the Eiswert case, is that a grievance
could spin into AI-fueled revenge-a
parent unhappy about how a child was
disciplined, a student or staff member
angry about a decision. Shortly before
Darien created and spread the fake
audio clip, Eiswert had been investigating
Darien's alleged misuse of
school funds.
" We are vulnerable. Everything that
happens in the school funnels to me.
Credit and blame, " Shindel added.
Winterbottom, the principal from
Glen Burnie, said Darien's extreme
actions made her revisit the impact
she has on people, especially when
disciplinary issues are involved. But
getting charged by the police has
made Winterbottom hopeful that the
case has set up the right message.
" I'm ecstatic that they were able to
trace it [the audio]. The precedent is
that you're going to get caught, " she
said.
She hopes it will make people think
twice before they jump to conclusions
when they encounter a faked charge.
Districts can be proactive on AI
use, but can't prevent misuse
Eiswert, though pilloried on social
media and put on administrative leave
by his district, had the support of the
Council of Advisory and Supervisory
Employees, which represents school
administrators. CASE's executive director,
William Burke, said in an email
that CASE has maintained the audio
was AI-generated from the time it
surfaced.
CASE engaged AI experts to assess
if the audio was real, and put Eiswert
through a polygraph test, the results
of which, Burke said, showed conclusively
that Eiswert had not " made
the statements on the audio. " The
evidence from the AI experts and the
results of the polygraph were shared
with the police, Burke said.
Eiswert did not respond to several
requests for comments sent via
CASE, which is handling media inquiries
related to the incident.
Such investigations can prove expensive
and time consuming for
unions, schools, and district administrations,
especially if they have to
investigate multiple cases.
" School and district administrators
will be given what looks like real
evidence [of wrongdoing]. If they
don't know the risks associated with
a tool like AI, they may believe the
evidence even if it's falsified, " said
Adam Blaylock, a lawyer who works
with school districts in Michigan.
Blaylock fears that the lack of
awareness about AI could put districts
at the risk of lawsuits. " If you
end a young administrator's career
based on something that's not true,
it opens up the district to a huge risk
of litigation, " Blaylock said.
As for victims of AI frauds, states'
defamation laws typically put the
burden of proof on the victim, who
would have to engage experts to prove
it's not them on the audio or video, an
expensive proposition.
" A principal, like in Pikesville's case,
may feel personally harmed. But if
there was no firing or demotion, they
will be hard pressed to show damages, "
Blaylock said.
Blaylock is keen to help school districts
avoid the pitfalls of AI generated
deepfakes. His advice is to build defenses
to help identify AI-generated
content.
Updating student and employee
handbooks with specific clauses about
AI is one idea.
" We have one districtwide policy
about technology misuse, which covers
cellphones. It should now have
language specific to AI, " said Winterbottom.
School
and district teams should
have one member who is either an
AI expert, or constantly updates
their knowledge about the quick
developments in the technology.
" There are some telltale signs of
AI-generated content. People in AI
videos will sometimes have six fingers.
The expert on the team will be
familiar with these indicators, " said
Blaylock.
Ultimately, there is no Turnitin for
AI deepfakes yet, Blaylock said, referring
to the popular tool used to detect
plagiarism in student work. District
administrators can only hedge the
risk-maintain a list of approved generative-AI
tools, train individuals on
the appropriate use of AI, and comply
with data-protection standards when
dealing with any contractor who will
use the school's data.
Blaylock encourages individual
school leaders to maintain a healthy
skepticism about media that seems
incredulous, while not backing away
from muscular leadership.
" The risk is going to be focused on
how we review information, " he said.
" But I can't ask school leaders not to
do what's best for their kids ... because
they're scared of a deepfake. "
Want to Boost Students' Focus During Tests?
Check the Time of Day
By Sarah D. Sparks
Testing is about more than just knowing the
content. Illness, weariness, anxiety, and boredom
can all distract students and undercut their
performance on tests. A new study suggests
proper timing can make a big difference in
whether students accurately show what they
know and can do.
Formative assessments can be more important
in guiding instruction than high-stakes
standardized tests.
" In the case of low-stakes assessments, I
would recommend testing in the morning, " said
Megan Kuhfeld, a senior research scientist for the
Collaborative for Student Growth at the testing
group NWEA and the study's author. " In lunchtime
and early afternoon, there does seem to be a
slump. "
Kuhfeld and other researchers from the
assessment group NWEA tracked students'
distraction during testing on
a commonly used adaptive
benchmarking test. First, they
gauged how frequently students
simply guessed at answers by
looking at how quickly students
completed each question and how
that pace changed over the course
of the test. Second, they scored the
first and second half of the tests
separately, to measure how sharply
performance dropped toward the
end of the test.
Students were deemed
" disengaged " if performance in the
second half of their test dropped
significantly from their first half,
or if 10 percent or more of their
questions had been answered too
quickly for the student to have read
and understood what was being
asked.
Researchers marked the start time
for more than a half million of the
computer-adaptive MAP Growth
assessments in reading and math
taken by students in grades 2-8. Each
test ran about 45 minutes to an hour,
and schools administered about
two-thirds of the tests studied in the
morning.
Kuhfeld and her colleagues found
across testing times, with students' performance
dropping about 3 percent in math and 4 percent in
reading over the course of the test.
Students in middle school grades were more likely
to disengage during tests than students in early
grades, regardless of the time of day. But " younger
kids' context matters more, " Kuhfeld said, " in that
the more tired they are, the more they're going to
disengage. Younger kids would be more likely to
give their full effort if being tested at a time that is
well suited for them. "
Many elementary schools, such as Tillford
Elementary in Vinton, Iowa, already schedule the
most academically strenuous classes-like a long
literacy block-first thing in the morning.
Boys also had higher disengagement than girls,
and students were slightly more likely to remain
focused during math than reading tests.
It's not clear, however, whether students'
attention is more related to the overall time
students have been in school or the time of
"
In the case of low-stakes
assessments, I would recommend
testing in the morning.
MEGAN KUHFELD
Senior research scientist,
Collaborative for Student Growth, NWEA
students whose tests started at 7 a.m.
guessed at less than 3 percent of questions on
average. By contrast, rapid guessing rose sharply
after noon, and students whose math tests started
at 1 p.m. guessed at 8.5 percent of questions,
nearly triple the guessing rate of morning tests,
" which would also indicate that they're probably
not giving their full effort for the latter half of the
test, " Kuhfeld said. Rapid guessing also nearly
doubled in reading, from 8.5 percent for 7 a.m.
tests to 15.5 percent for 1 p.m. tests.
The pattern held for students across achievement
levels, though the lowest-achievement students
were the most likely to become disengaged during
a test. Overall performance declines held steady
day. For example, while this study looked
only at elementary and middle schools, prior
studies have found high school students' test
performance can improve when their schools
start later in the morning-in keeping with
adolescents' later circadian cycles.
Kuhfeld said future studies will control for the
amount of time students have been in school as well
as the test start time; for example, the difference
between a student starting a test at 8:30 a.m. when
their school starts at 8 a.m. or 7 a.m.
If educators do need to assess students after
lunch, incorporating brief stretches or other
cognitive breaks may help return students' focus.
From academic recovery to student mental health, teachers and education leaders are grappling with big questions and
challenges. This research column aims to help readers understand what the research says-and doesn't say-about the
current context for learning and learning in general. If you have a question, please send it to ssparks@educationweek.org.
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Education Week - May 29, 2024

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