Kyrie Harmon just started her high school journey at Northwest School of the Arts, and she already has a message for her teachers: put the computers down more often. Her wish comes as artificial intelligence tools have become nearly ubiquitous across K-12 education in North Carolina and the rest of the country, showing up in classrooms and student homework alike.
Harmon wants more teacher-on-student interaction and less reliance on computers, as reported by WBTV. “More teacher-on-student interaction, less ‘here's a computer, have fun,’” she told the station. Her comment lands amid national numbers showing just how far AI has already crept into daily schoolwork.
Per a Common Sense Media study cited by WBTV, 63% of teens have used AI to complete their schoolwork. Nearly 40% of surveyed teens in that same study said they felt they were missing out because of over-reliance on artificial intelligence in education, a worry that echoes Harmon's own call for more face-to-face guidance from teachers.
National Numbers Back Up the Classroom Shift
Harmon's experience fits into a much bigger national pattern. A separate August 2026 report from Common Sense Media's Youth AI Safety Institute found that 70% of U.S. teenagers aged 13 to 17 use AI tools for schoolwork, with 63% of those AI-using teens obtaining direct answers straight from the platforms, according to the Youth AI Safety Institute.
That same survey, detailed by KQED, found the picture is more nuanced than simple cheating. Among teen AI users, 77% say they use the tools to brainstorm, check work, or get feedback without lifting answers wholesale. Of those who do take direct answers, 25% copy the AI text as-is, 31% rewrite it to sound like themselves, and 35% blend it with their own knowledge.
Yet the same body of research points to a literacy gap that helps explain why students like Harmon feel unmoored. Only 27% of U.S. teens have discussed with a teacher what AI actually is and how it works, and just 44% said a teacher had ever talked with them about when AI should or should not be used for assignments, the Youth AI Safety Institute found. Pew Research Center added its own data point in February, reporting that 64% of U.S. teens use AI chatbots, with 34% naming overreliance and the loss of critical thinking as their top worry about AI's effect on society.
Educators Sound Similar Alarms
Krista Glazewski, executive director of the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation at NC State, cautioned that decision making and human judgment can be augmented by these technologies but should never be replaced by them, per WBTV's reporting. Her institute isn't just commenting from the sidelines — in October 2025 it received a $1.9 million portion of a $3.5 million National Science Foundation grant to expand its PrimaryAI program, bringing AI literacy and inquiry-based STEM learning to more than 5,000 upper elementary students across rural North Carolina, Indiana, and Alabama.
Teachers appear to share some of Harmon's unease. A Center for Democracy & Technology report found that 86% of high school students and 85% of middle and high school teachers used generative AI during the 2024-25 school year, a sharp jump from 58% of students and 51% of teachers the year before, according to Education Week. The same report found that 56% of students whose schools use AI for multiple purposes feel less connected to their teachers as a result, while 70% of surveyed teachers worry the technology is weakening critical thinking and research skills.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg's Rules of the Road
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, where Northwest School of the Arts sits, isn't ignoring the trend. The district's Board of Education adopted Board Policy O-AIU in October 2025, requiring all AI tools used in schools to be FERPA-compliant while explicitly stating that AI cannot replace human interaction, creativity, or decision-making in education.
The policy grew out of a “Literacy First” philosophy the district adopted in 2025, which requires staff and students to complete foundational AI literacy training before they're granted access to the tools — a framework shaped by input from more than 10,000 community members gathered in early 2025. North Carolina itself got a head start on the issue: the state's Department of Public Instruction published guidance on generative AI adoption in PK-13 public schools back in January 2024, making it the fourth state in the nation to issue statewide K-12 AI recommendations, according to the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction.
Other districts nearby have been wrestling with the same balance. Hoodline previously reported that Brevard schools set new AI rules restricting AI-written submissions while still allowing research help, and that Greenville County Schools moved to limit screen time alongside its own generative AI rules. For now, students like Harmon are left navigating policies built at the district and state level while hoping for more of the one-on-one attention that got lost somewhere between the guidance documents and the chatbot window.
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