Estonia Is Giving Every 10th and 11th Grader a ChatGPT Account
After a 2024 poll showed nine in ten high schoolers already used AI for schoolwork, officials decided doing nothing was the worst choice.
The Journal. · The High Schools Going All-In on AIEstonia began giving every 10th and 11th grader a school ChatGPT account last year under a national program called the AI Leap.
The move came after a 2024 poll showed nine in ten high schoolers were already turning to generative AI for schoolwork, raising the question of how students can still learn when machines can do schoolwork for them. WSJ reporter Sam Schechner, who visited schools in Estonia, says officials there figured doing nothing was the worst choice.
The effort builds on an earlier technology push. After breaking away from Soviet rule in the early 1990s, Estonia put the internet and computers in classrooms through a program called the Tiger Leap. Leaders still describe Estonia as a digital country, and the new program follows that instinct by working with OpenAI and later Google to supply free chatbots to a huge group of teenagers.
Early use has been limited: about 65% of students with access had activated their school accounts by the time classes wrapped up last year, but only a minority use them regularly. Estonia is now bringing 12th graders and vocational school students into the program as well.
Whether guided access improves learning is still unknown, and the results are not in yet. The test, Schechner says, is whether students do better, and "if Estonia can chart a path" to stronger results, it could offer lessons for schools from Boise to Botswana.
Questions people ask
What is different about the school version of ChatGPT?
It is a version of ChatGPT set up for schools that is designed to act more like a tutor than an answer machine. Instead of directly giving homework answers, it asks follow-up questions and walks students through how to approach a problem.
Why is Estonia so focused on being digital?
Estonia is a small Baltic nation of about 1.4 million people that rebuilt its government and schools around the internet after leaving the Soviet Union in 1991. It offers citizens online voting, digital ID cards, and online access to most government services, so schools were an early focus for technology.
Has any place in the United States tried this?
U.S. schools have mostly handled AI district by district, with some bans, some paid pilot programs, and many teachers setting their own rules. No state or district has given every high school student a national, government-backed AI account on Estonia's scale.