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3w ago

Teachers’ Unions Partner With AI Giants to Launch National AI Training Academy

Based at UFT’s Manhattan headquarters with $23 million in backing, the academy will launch fall workshops to equip 400,000 K-12 educators with practical, ethically grounded AI skills over five years.

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As schools and teachers scramble to figure out whether and how to implement AI in the classroom, three leading tech companies are investing in a new training program for educators.
AI leaders funnel $23 million into new labor-backed training program for teachers.
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Overview

  • Microsoft, OpenAI and Anthropic have committed a combined $23 million—$12.5 million from Microsoft, $10 million from OpenAI (including $2 million in technical resources) and $500,000 from Anthropic—to fund the academy.
  • The National Academy for AI Instruction will operate from the United Federation of Teachers’ downtown Manhattan headquarters and begin in-person and virtual workshops this fall.
  • Programming designed by AI experts and educators will include hands-on training, online courses and curriculum guidance on safe, ethical and effective classroom applications of AI.
  • Over the next five years the initiative aims to train 400,000 K-12 teachers, seeking to narrow adoption gaps between high- and low-poverty school districts.
  • The union-backed effort builds on White House AI education pledges and draws inspiration from established labor–industry training models to democratize AI access in schools.