The San Francisco school board was all set to approve a contract to provide “ChatGPT Edu” to 12,000 users across the district at its Feb. 10 meeting.
The district’s technology services officer signed the order form on Jan. 22, and OpenAI’s head of education countersigned it four days later.
Then, the district nixed it from the agenda. Why?
District officials did not answer that question, but said the proposal would give district staff ChatGPT “accounts and free training,” and “does not involve any financial cost to the district.”
It is unclear if that means a private funder is behind the effort. The contract shared with the school board had a price, but it was redacted.
The OpenAI contract had been scheduled for the school board’s “consent calendar,” meaning that it could have been approved by the board without public discussion. But SFUSD is also in the middle of heated labor talks, and is facing down the potential of a historic teacher’s strike, perhaps as soon as Feb. 9.
Ahead of an emergency board meeting on Tuesday, school board members raised concerns on Monday night about the contract’s heavily redacted details, including its total cost. By Tuesday morning, the agenda item was removed, according to the district’s spokesperson.
It is unclear how much the contract would have cost the district. It would have applied for one year, from Feb. 2, 2026, to Feb. 1 next year, but the price of the agreement was redacted from a document shared with the school board, as was a bullet point discussing the terms of the contract.
ChatGPT Edu provides access to OpenAI’s flagship AI model for use in the classroom and by administrators. It is used by at least 15 school systems, according to OpenAI’s site, including Oxford University and Columbia.
A similar contract inked by the California State University system reportedly cost the schools $15 million for 500,000 users for one year.
When the tool was launched last year, it was marketed toward universities, not public K-12 schools.
“This proposed agreement would establish clear guardrails around data protection, privacy, and responsible use,” Laura Dudnick, a district spokesperson, wrote in a statement.
Board members raised questions after they noticed the document attached to the agenda, and the redacted price.
During a board meeting held on Jan. 27, the school board gave Superintendent Maria Su the power to redact information on an agenda item up until 72 hours before a meeting. That’s what Su appeared to have done in this case.
Typically, San Francisco public documents are redacted to protect personal privacy by blocking out addresses, names, and contact information — not information about pricing or scope of a contract.
The agreement comes amid labor negotiations with the teachers union, which has threatened to walk out of school classrooms in the coming days if an agreement to raise salaries and improve healthcare plans, among other demands, is not made.
The union has also demanded to regulate the use of artificial intelligence in the classroom so that it won’t negatively impact student learning or replace educator’s jobs. As of May of last year, according to the union, the district rejected the language of these demands.
The district, which is seeking to reduce its budget by $102 million, and the teacher’s union have declared an impasse in ongoing negotiations.
The strike could begin as early as next week.
I find the zero cost thing pretty hard to believe. Based on the SBUSD contract referenced in the SFUSD one, the licenses cost around $228 each. However, SFUSD is paying Google $324 per license for Gemini, so it could be more! (When it comes to everything except the people working in schools, SFUSD always has plenty of money, it seems!)
If the district received a grant to cover the cost, the Board would have to approve that. Nothing like that is on the agenda. If the contract was free, it wouldn’t be on the consent calendar. It would be part of the item for accepting gifts.
I do not think the district needs 12,000 licenses from OpenAI, especially given that they already have Gemini via the Google suite. (I’d argue we should get rid of Gemini as well, especially at that cost.) But contracts like these – lacking transparency, using public resources for private ends – are why it’s always good to put in some time reading draft agendas.
The redaction is a big problem. Shit, OpenAI in classrooms is a problem. Please follow up on this reporting.
Worth noting that a certain handful of tech sector people were HEAVILY interested and involved in promoting the school board recall. In fact, one specific person (does “drunkenly posting public death threats against our board members ring any bells?) also had a very public post celebrating the BOE recall w alcoholic. Interesting
Hahaha definitely not
The cost doesn’t matter, Open AI is getting to charge our students for using themselves to train their model. This comprises the privacy of our children, while hidden data centers blow up our carbon footprints, additionally making their futures worse. The SFUSD should not treat this as a reference tool, they need to weigh the real world costs of putting our kids into the Matrix.
You really should try reading the article. The software package is not for kids to use. It’s for instructors. That’s why it’s for 12,000 users not 50,000+. Also, it appears the district is backing out of the deal, so what’s with the outrage?