Montgomery County Public Schools students returned to class Tuesday, Aug. 25, and Superintendent Thomas Taylor used the occasion to outline three priorities that will shape the year ahead for families in the Churchill and Wootton clusters: mandatory AI literacy training already completed for all staff, a K-8 screen-time audit due in March and a blunt warning about federal funding cuts.

"We are studying the screen time and impact of technology in classrooms this year and this will inform a lot going forward …" Taylor told WTOP.

AI guidelines now in effect

Every MCPS staff member has completed mandatory AI literacy training, Taylor said, and the district has issued new guidelines for classroom use. The training responds to Maryland's Artificial Intelligence Ready Schools Act, signed by Gov. Wes Moore in May, which gave districts 120 days to establish AI policies after state guidance was issued.

Taylor said the guidelines help teachers use AI for instructional planning while teaching students to engage with the technology "safely, critically and productively." Student use remains more heavily monitored, with a focus on transparency.

Screen-time audit targets K-8

The district is auditing how much time kindergarten through eighth-grade students spend on school-issued Chromebooks. Results are due to the Board of Education by March 2027. The audit will measure average daily screen time, identify opportunities to reduce it and assess whether content filters are blocking inappropriate material.

The effort was prompted partly by a Montgomery County Council of PTAs survey of roughly 1,000 respondents who reported concerns about excessive Chromebook use and access to inappropriate content. At an Aug. 14 board meeting, as reported by The Banner, Taylor said school-issued devices would reveal "an awful lot about the programs that are used, the software that we use, how frequently we use it … That'll be a critical data point."

Chromebook screen repairs alone are estimated to cost MCPS more than $3 million this school year, with keyboard and trackpad fixes adding another $800,000, according to The Banner.

The audit runs alongside MCPS's new "away all day" bell-to-bell cellphone ban for all students, which took effect Tuesday, a year ahead of Maryland's statewide mandate.

Federal funding warning

Taylor reserved his sharpest language for potential federal cuts, warning they "disproportionately affect our most vulnerable students." He said reductions risk impacting Title I equity initiatives, mental and behavioral health services, special education, English multilingual learner supports and after-school programming.

The district has "developed systems of care to prevent serious service impacts," Taylor said, but added: "This approach can't last forever and we will need a more sustainable approach in the future."

Those pressures compound a tight budget year. The County Council's $7.9 billion operating budget left a $36 million shortfall for MCPS, resulting in hundreds of position cuts, according to Bethesda Magazine. The district also faces a $3 billion backlog of deferred maintenance across 224 buildings.

The screen-time audit results are due to the board by March 2027, the next concrete milestone families can watch for as the district navigates budget constraints and its new technology policies.