If we’ve learned one thing in our eight years publishing SchoolCEO, it’s this: School leaders love their work. Nearly every time we talk to a superintendent, school communicator or anyone else in education, their eyes light up as they talk about their students and the innovative ways they’re working to better serve them.
But while school leadership is deeply meaningful, it can also be incredibly tedious. For every hour spent speaking with student council members or developing strategies to improve literacy, there’s just as much time spent poring over spreadsheets or completing repetitive paperwork. And those time-consuming tasks, while necessary, eat into time school leaders could be spending on the work that impacts students most—and that feeds their own sense of purpose. After all, we’ve yet to interview anyone who got into school leadership because of their passion for reviewing RFPs.
So it’s no wonder that many school leaders and communicators feel intrigued and excited by the potential of artificial intelligence. But while opportunity beckons, leaders and comms pros are also highly aware of risks inherent in AI, including ethical quandaries and concerns about privacy.
Our newest research project, slated to be released later this fall, seeks to contribute to a deeper conversation about AI—one that goes beyond skyrocketing user metrics and buzz about the latest GPT model. Leaning both on data and on the expertise of school leaders leveraging AI, we'll work to answer the questions: How is AI changing the day-to-day work of school administration? And what will this mean for education as a whole?
To give an idea of the insights we'll bring to the table, we're giving you a sneak peek at our findings—as well as a few quotes from administrators and communicators using AI to streamline their work.
Major Findings
A substantial portion of our survey participants—including superintendents, school communicators and other school administrators—consider themselves "somewhat familiar" (47%) or "very familiar" (40%) with AI tools. Only 11% describe themselves as "neutral," and 2% report being “not very familiar.
Participants of all ages say they believe in the importance of AI for school communication—but respondents between 41 and 60 report using AI for communication tasks most often compared to other age groups.
Nearly all our respondents—97%—report having personally experimented with AI tools for their professional duties.
Among central office roles, communications professionals report the highest volume of AI usage and use a broader range of AI tools compared to other roles.
What We're Hearing About AI
"AI is changing how we view what we do as school communicators. It challenges the idea that productivity is only about output. It’s pushing us to think more creatively, to think strategically, and it’s giving us time back to focus on relationships—the human side of work.”
—Director of Marketing and Community Relations Cristina Capretta, APR, Berea City School District, OH
As a profession, we need to think more about using AI strategically and not just tactically.”
—Superintendent Dr. Gustavo Balderas, Beaverton School District, OR
Across the country, conversations are happening about teacher retention and wellness. When I think about AI, I wonder what it would be like to get 35 teachers in the room to hear about the most tedious or annoying parts of their jobs. For example, I had a veteran teacher reach out after I showed her how to use AI to write data-informed report card comments. She told me they were the best ones she had written in 25 years—in a fraction of the time.
This is what I want to do with AI. I want to help educators get back to what they enjoy.”
—Central Information Officer Kris Hagel, Peninsula School District, WA
We used AI to help us write a new mission statement. A lot of times, this is really tedious—you spend hours arguing with nine people over word choice, and it's a waste of time. So in one board meeting, I worked with my board members to make a word cloud, including everything they valued about our district. Then I put that word cloud into ChatGPT and had it create a vision using the language of my board members. Within 45 minutes, we had a working mission and vision statement for the district.
I used that same process repeatedly to help me create our five-year strategic plan for the district—with parents, with the board members, with the teachers, with the kids. Doing a strategic plan as a superintendent is tricky, because you don't want anyone to think that it's your plan. It has to be our plan. Using AI helped us incorporate all of their language, all of their values, all of their beliefs into a plan that was truly our plan.”—Superintendent Dr. Peter Hughes, Cresskill Public Schools, NJ
Where I use AI is in the analysis of data. As an example: It would take hours to go through parent surveys and read every response—and it would be even more difficult to determine what themes are coming out of all of these responses. An AI—ChatGPT or whatever you’re using—can do all of that for you.
We've used that with our teachers, too, around some difficult topics. For example, if their students’ attendance is poor, we'll analyze that and say, ‘Hey, here are the trends that ChatGPT has provided.’ It takes the personal sting out of an administrator critiquing them.”
—Assistant Superintendent of Educational Services Dr. Ben Boothe, Gardner Edgerton USD 231, KS
We ran multiple staff events we called ‘AI playgrounds.’ We started each one by defining terms and talking about potential pitfalls—but then we just let everyone play around with some AI tools we had vetted. The goal was to bring anxiety down. We specifically didn't call it a training, because that would position us as the experts—and we’re not experts, either. We were all just playing together.”
—Superintendent Dr. Kelly May-Vollmar, Desert Sands Unified School District, CA
From the data we’ve collected so far, it’s clear that most school communicators and leaders are thinking about AI and experimenting with AI in their work. As long as it’s implemented smartly and safely, it has enormous potential to make work both easier and more efficient.
In January 2026, we’ll dive further into this data with a special edition of SchoolCEO, all about AI—but first, we’ll release the full research online later this fall. Stay tuned for more detailed findings on what is surely the hottest topic in K-12 education.