You can read it here: read.priten.org/p/the-margin.... And, make sure to subscribe to get each week's issue in your inbox!

Check out the episode at listen.priten.org/s1/4, and remember to subscribe and follow for future episodes!

For examples of educators reclaiming their agency hear from teachers explaining how they are exercising their professional judgement in both adopting and resisting AI in the classroom at listen.priten.org.

For more on why the "why" matters, I wrote a whole book about it. It starts with getting clear on your values before making any technology decisions. You can learn more at ethicaledtech.org.

How are you preserving your professional judgment without letting it get undermined by external rhetoric?

Until we can name those aims, we won’t be able to see why our agency is worth fighting for.

I’ve been trying to lead more conversations around what I strongly believe is a first step towards responsible decision-making on technology’s future in education. We need to be clear on what we actually believe education is for.

But also, they can focus on skills and content that they know is valuable outside of the AI bubble. They can limit the impact of technology in their classroom or wait it out until they have more evidence of what that impact even is.

They can use AI when it suits their goals and teaching styles. They can talk about AI when it’s relevant to their curriculum.

We need to remind educators that they do have a choice.

Educators are professionals entrusted with the development of other people's children. We trust them enough to put them in charge of children's development and safety but not enough to let them exercise judgment about the tools they use? That contradiction should bother us."

But that’s a choice in and of itself. It's a decision to stop asking why. To let momentum stand in for reasoning. To treat inevitability as if it were the most important value.

However, I think we willingly give up agency more than we realize. By adopting the new platform. By keeping the tool the district already paid for. And, by moving faster because everyone else is.

We keep seeing partnerships between tech and schools/universities. We’re reading obsessively techno-optimist news. And, we’re dealing with folks who are racing to embed their existing products with AI before anyone even asks for it. These create a feeling of momentum that feels impossible to resist.

Every time we say it, we give up a little more of our professional judgment. And a lot more of our moral agency. Of course, this is our response when external pressures are telling us to move even faster.

Relevant Articles:
www.npr.org/2026/01/28/n...
actionnetwork.org/petitions/pl...

For more on what I mean by the can-should framing, check out my upcoming Wiley book, Ethical Ed Tech, by visiting ethicaledtech.org!

You can also hear the conversations that helped guide the book on my podcast: listen.priten.org!

What worries you most about how we're integrating technology in schools right now?