Google says K-12 schools will be able to turn on Gemini, Gemini Notebook and Search individually, but that still doesn’t get them Google Search without AI. The company clarified its new education controls in an X post after some backlash:
Gemini, Gemini Notebook, and Search will be OFF by default. … Schools are in control: They can choose to turn ON one, two, or all of these services individually.
Google’s original announcement said these products and Gemini in Classroom “will be entirely off for K-12 student accounts until school administrators explicitly turn them on.” The backlash followed a report in The New York Times, where Chris Phillips, Google’s vice president for education, said “Search and AI are deeply integrated.” Students at a school that has banned AI, he added, “will not have access to search, and they’ll see a message from their school that indicates it’s not available.”
New York City (NYC) Mayor Zohran Mamdani wrote on X that Google “is trying to use its monopoly power to force AI into our public schools,” and Senator Bernie Sanders called the policy “extortion.” Google’s answer is that the changes “give schools more choice, not less.”
A school can turn on Search and leave the Gemini tools off. Search itself, though, keeps AI Mode and AI Overviews, which Google says “will offer step-by-step guided learning through problems.” Schools that allow AI will reportedly get two different versions: one with AI Overviews and AI chats on, like the consumer product, and one built on Guided Learning, meant to coach students instead of answering for them.
NYC and Los Angeles (LA), the two largest US school districts and both Google clients, curbed student use of generative AI on school devices in September. LA officials hoped students could keep searching Google with AI Overviews off, an option Google’s post doesn’t address.
The new defaults are reportedly set to arrive in early 2027, reversing an August change that turned on AI features by default in Classroom for K-12 schools that already allowed Gemini.
Google says schools will get the specifics in the coming months. Guided Learning in Search starts first, as a pilot in select US schools later this month.
