{"id":28543,"date":"2026-11-06T21:17:03","date_gmt":"2026-11-06T21:17:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/11\/06\/edtech-experts-scratch-their-heads-as-google-search-becomes-unavailable-to-classrooms-banning-ai-fortune\/"},"modified":"2026-11-06T21:17:03","modified_gmt":"2026-11-06T21:17:03","slug":"edtech-experts-scratch-their-heads-as-google-search-becomes-unavailable-to-classrooms-banning-ai-fortune","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/11\/06\/edtech-experts-scratch-their-heads-as-google-search-becomes-unavailable-to-classrooms-banning-ai-fortune\/","title":{"rendered":"Edtech experts scratch their heads as Google Search becomes unavailable to classrooms banning AI – Fortune"},"content":{"rendered":"

Google\u2019s updated policy on how schools access its AI tools has raised questions among educational technology experts about the rationale behind the decision.
The tech company on Tuesday announced<\/a> plans to turn off AI tools in its software for students, which can be reversed by a school administrator\u2019s decision. Google said the change would enable K-12 classrooms to have more control over how students engage with AI.
But if a school restricts AI entirely, its students will no longer be able to use Google\u2019s Search feature.\u00a0
A social media post<\/a> from Google clarifying the changes, which will be implemented early next year, explained the feature was meant to provide schools with \u201cmore choice, not less\u201d by creating the option for administrators to enable Gemini, Gemini Notebook, and Search. However, Google\u2019s Search function is embedded with AI Mode and AI Overview that cannot be disabled, meaning schools with AI bans are unable to grant students access to the tool.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who issued a one-year moratorium on generative AI<\/a> for public schools through eighth grade, was among politicians and policy experts<\/a> criticizing the inextricable integration of Google Search with AI tools. The move, critics said, was a means of taking advantage of its monopoly to push use of its AI features.
\u201cGoogle is trying to use its monopoly power to force AI into our public schools,\u201d he wrote on social media<\/a> on Wednesday. \u201cNo 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.\u201d
Experts who study technology use in classrooms had slightly different responses, suggesting that Google\u2019s AI-laden Search feature could actually have an adverse impact on its goal of being used in classrooms in the first place.
\u201cI\u2019m guessing from a business angle, they\u2019re just doubling down as much as they can to try and force people to use AI,\u201d neuroscientist and former teacher Jared Cooney Horvath, told Fortune<\/em>. \u201cBut from a pure learning angle, why?\u201d
U.S. schools have spent more than $30 billion<\/a> as of 2024 to provide laptops to students, with Google\u2019s Chromebooks being among the most ubiquitous. By 2017, the low-cost computers accounted for more than half<\/a> of digital devices sent to classrooms. More classrooms using Chromebooks was lucrative for Google, too, and as of 2025, education represented 60% of Chromebook\u2019s global market share<\/a>, which totals $14 billion.
An internal presentation<\/a> from the company in November 2020 said exposing students to Google\u2019s interface would create future customers (\u201cYou get that loyalty early, and potentially for life.\u201d) A Google spokesperson said at the time<\/a> the documents \u201cmischaracterized our work.\u201d
But the reality of how AI is being used\u2014or rather limited\u2014in the classroom could threaten Google\u2019s classroom presence to begin with. Jose Antonio Bowen, a consultant on technology in the classroom and a former president of Goucher College, explained in an email to Fortune<\/em> that AI subverts the process of learning\u2014which requires working hard\u2014so many teachers are encouraged to use it sparingly<\/a>, such as for teachers to create lesson plans, not for students to look up information.
\u201cWhat Google and other companies seem to be doing is streamlining and integrating AI (surely reducing internal costs) and that might work in other realms of AI use,\u201d Bowen said. \u201cBut this makes AI an outlier in use: Yes, most people will find AI search useful for most cases, but in education it can\u2019t be unfettered access.\u201d
Horvath, a longtime critic<\/a> of the unchecked use of technology in classrooms, suggested Google\u2019s decision not to allow users to turn off AI Mode or AI Overview from Search could actually incentivize more classrooms to turn back to analog research tools.
\u201cI guess maybe this is a good thing in the sense that now it will force schools to think twice before just going to Google when it comes time to do research: Maybe go to a book. Maybe go to the library,\u201d he said.
Bowen noted Google Search\u2019s structure could also open doors for companies like DuckDuckGo, which has positioned itself as an AI-free search engine because it can automatically turn off AI summaries and filter out AI-generated images in private searches.
DuckDuckGO founder and CEO Gabriel Weinberg told Fortune <\/em>in an email he\u2019s seeing more companies putting AI into features \u201cmaking it increasingly impossible to turn off.\u201d Weinberg said that after Google announced in May it would overhaul Search and integrate it with Gemini 3.5 Flash, DuckDuckGo saw a tripling in traffic to its no-AI search page, which has since remained elevated.
Sasha Rogelberg is a reporter and former editorial fellow on the news desk at <\/span>Fortune<\/span><\/i>, covering retail and the intersection of business and popular culture.<\/span>
\u00a9 2026 Fortune Media IP Limited. All Rights Reserved. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Use<\/a> and Privacy Policy<\/a> | CA Notice at Collection and Privacy Notice<\/a>\u00a0| Do Not Sell\/Share My Personal Information<\/a>
FORTUNE is a trademark of Fortune Media IP Limited, registered in the U.S. and other countries. FORTUNE may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice.<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Google\u2019s updated policy on how schools access its AI tools has raised questions among educational technology experts about the rationale behind the decision.The tech company on Tuesday announced plans to turn off AI tools in its software for students, which can be reversed by a school administrator\u2019s decision. Google said the change would enable K-12 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":28544,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28543"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28543\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}