Google Is Forcing AI Overviews in Classrooms. Schools Are Searching for a Way Out

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Two weeks ago, an IT administrator for an elementary-middle school took to Google’s support forums requesting a way to block students from seeing AI Overviews—the chatbot-generated answers at the top of search results. “This seems counterproductive to what we’re trying to teach,” the administrator wrote. “Students need opportunities to navigate search results, examine sources, and draw their own conclusions rather than being handed an AI-generated synthesis before they’ve even started.”

两周前，一位中小学的IT管理员在谷歌的支持论坛上发帖，请求提供一种方法来阻止学生查看“AI概览”（AI Overviews）——即搜索结果顶部由聊天机器人生成的答案。这位管理员写道：“这似乎与我们的教学目标背道而驰。学生们需要的是浏览搜索结果、审视来源并得出自己结论的机会，而不是在开始之前就被直接塞给一个由人工智能生成的综合结论。”

No one from Google responded to the concern, which has been bubbling up for years. But counterparts from three districts voiced similar frustration and pointed to work-arounds they were employing or considering to block AI Overviews in lieu of an official “off” switch. Their expertise is about to be in demand.

谷歌方面无人回应这一多年来不断发酵的担忧。但来自三个学区的同行表达了类似的沮丧，并指出他们正在使用或考虑使用一些变通方法来屏蔽“AI概览”，以替代官方的“关闭”开关。他们的这些经验很快就会变得炙手可热。

Google announced on Tuesday that it is declining to provide schools an option to disable AI Overviews. Instead, starting next year, schools will have to block access to search altogether to get rid of the feature. The decision has stunned educators, parents, and technology researchers across the US.

谷歌周二宣布，拒绝为学校提供禁用“AI概览”的选项。相反，从明年开始，学校如果想摆脱这一功能，就必须完全屏蔽对搜索服务的访问。这一决定令全美的教育工作者、家长和技术研究人员感到震惊。

“We were flabbergasted,” says Dominique Johnson, part of an Oregon community group called Lake Oswego Parents for Responsible Technology. “This move makes things even more difficult for school districts that have determined AI is harmful to foundational learning.”

“我们感到目瞪口呆，”俄勒冈州一个名为“莱克奥斯威戈负责任技术家长联盟”的社区组织成员多米尼克·约翰逊（Dominique Johnson）表示，“对于那些已经认定人工智能对基础学习有害的学区来说，这一举措让情况变得更加困难。”

Google didn’t respond to a request for comment. But in a public response to the controversy shared on X, the company contended that schools will now have “more choice, not less” because search, its Gemini chatbot, and Gemini Notebook tool will be off by default starting next year. Administrators can enable one, two, or all three services.

谷歌未回应置评请求。但在X平台上针对此次争议发表的公开回应中，该公司辩称，学校现在将拥有“更多而非更少的选择”，因为从明年开始，搜索服务、Gemini聊天机器人和Gemini Notebook工具将默认处于关闭状态。管理员可以选择启用其中一项、两项或全部三项服务。

The issue for schools and parents, though, is that Google considers AI Overviews and a companion feature called AI Mode inseparable from the traditional search experience. Respectively launched in 2023 and 2025, they bring the functionality of AI chatbots, such as Gemini or ChatGPT, directly into search results.

然而，学校和家长们面临的问题在于，谷歌认为“AI概览”及其配套功能“AI模式”（AI Mode）与传统的搜索体验是不可分割的。这两个功能分别于2023年和2025年推出，将Gemini或ChatGPT等人工智能聊天机器人的功能直接引入了搜索结果中。

“Kids are already using these search-bar summaries to skip real effort, pulling instant math answers and letting AI write their essays,” Johnson says. “To make matters worse, these AI snapshots frequently make mistakes and output false facts, which younger students take as absolute truth.”

“孩子们已经在利用这些搜索栏摘要来逃避真正的努力，直接获取数学答案，并让AI代写论文，”约翰逊说，“更糟糕的是，这些AI快照经常出错并输出虚假事实，而低年级学生却将其视为绝对真理。”

The AI-generated responses are tempting to read and are often good enough to trust, triggering headaches beyond classrooms. Wikipedia, news websites, and education tools have lost human visitors as people rely on overviews. Google uses the same bots to crawl the web for its search and AI products, making it impossible for publishers to opt out of their content being used for the latter.

人工智能生成的回答读起来很诱人，而且往往足以让人信任，这在课堂之外也引发了头疼的问题。随着人们越来越依赖“AI概览”，维基百科、新闻网站和教育工具已经流失了大量人类访客。谷歌使用相同的机器人为其搜索和AI产品抓取网页内容，这使得出版商无法选择拒绝让自己的内容被用于后者。

Google’s push to make AI Overviews a prominent part of search has already come at a cost. Last week, shares of parent company Alphabet suffered their worst single-day selloff, erasing half a trillion dollars in market value after the company reported weaker-than-expected search ad sales. A big cause? Increased usage of AI Overviews and AI Mode, which aren’t packed with many ads yet—although some experts believe the slump will only be temporary.

谷歌推动将“AI概览”作为搜索的核心部分已经付出了代价。上周，在母公司Alphabet报告搜索广告销售额低于预期后，其股价遭遇了有史以来最严重的单日抛售，市值蒸发了五千亿美元。一个主要原因是什么？“AI概览”和“AI模式”的使用率增加，而这些功能目前尚未植入太多广告——尽管一些专家认为这种下滑只是暂时的。

For schools, the dilemma over search may be just beginning. While several districts WIRED contacted didn’t respond to requests for comment, Los Angeles Unified says it is still reviewing the potential implications of Google’s announcement. Some education technology experts argue that schools should abandon Google search altogether, or at least do a better job teaching students to question the validity of AI answers.

对于学校来说，关于搜索的困境可能才刚刚开始。虽然《连线》（WIRED）联系的几个学区没有回应置评请求，但洛杉矶联合学区表示，他们仍在评估谷歌公告的潜在影响。一些教育技术专家认为，学校应该完全放弃谷歌搜索，或者至少在教导学生质疑AI答案的有效性方面做得更好。

“Under-resourced districts will grit their teeth and say, ‘We don’t have the capacity to dig in our heels and not use Google,’” says Stephen Aguilar, who coleads the Center for Generative AI and Society at USC. “A lot are likely going to accelerate plans they already have to teach students about this new digital literacy.”

“资源匮乏的学区只能咬牙切齿地说：‘我们没有能力坚持不用谷歌，’”南加州大学生成式人工智能与社会中心联合负责人斯蒂芬·阿吉拉尔（Stephen Aguilar）表示，“许多学区可能会加速实施他们现有的计划，教导学生掌握这种新的数字素养。”

Parent advocates also plan to push districts to look elsewhere. “This move just continues a well-established pattern of big tech companies pushing products into classrooms,” says Karolle Rabarison, a policy and communications strategist who helps lead Schools Beyond Screens in Washington, DC. “It’s not going to work anymore.”

家长权益倡导者也计划推动学区寻找其他选择。“这一举动延续了大型科技公司将产品强行推入课堂的既定模式，”华盛顿特区“屏幕之外学校”（Schools Beyond Screens）组织的负责人之一、政策与传播策略师卡罗尔·拉巴里森（Karolle Rabarison）说，“这种做法行不通了。”

“Ludicrous” Refusal. Tech industry veterans disagree about how difficult it would be for Google to let schools disable AI Overviews without affecting the rest of Search. “It’s a question of whether they’re committed to maintaining two versions of search in the long run,” says Nicole Kerson, a former senior Google Search product manager who runs the AI strategy firm Collected Company. “It’s very hard to maintain a forked product like that.”

“荒谬”的拒绝。科技行业资深人士对于谷歌在不影响搜索其余部分的情况下让学校禁用“AI概览”有多大难度存在分歧。“这取决于他们是否致力于长期维护两个版本的搜索，”曾任谷歌搜索高级产品经理、现经营AI战略公司Collected Company的妮可·克森（Nicole Kerson）表示，“维护这样一个分叉的产品是非常困难的。”

Microsoft offers a Google Chrome extension that lets users turn off AI-generated summaries in Bing search. Adeel Khan, a former teacher and principal who now runs MagicSchool, which provides AI chatbots for students and teachers, says it is “infuriating, insulting, and ludicrous” that Google isn’t doing something similar.

微软提供了一个谷歌浏览器扩展程序，允许用户关闭必应搜索中AI生成的摘要。曾任教师和校长、现经营为师生提供AI聊天机器人的MagicSchool的阿迪尔·汗（Adeel Khan）表示，谷歌没有采取类似措施是“令人愤怒、侮辱性和荒谬的”。

Without an official way to disable AI Overviews, schools have turned to technical work-arounds, including modifying search URLs and adopting browser extensions that change how Google results appear. Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia recently developed its own extension. But these loopholes could stop functioning if Google changes how its search results are delivered.

由于没有官方途径禁用“AI概览”，学校转向了技术变通方案，包括修改搜索URL以及采用改变谷歌结果显示方式的浏览器扩展程序。弗吉尼亚州的费尔法克斯县公立学校最近开发了自己的扩展程序。但如果谷歌改变其搜索结果的交付方式，这些漏洞可能会失效。

Smaller search engines, such as the privacy-focused DuckDuckGo, see an opportunity to win business from schools frustrated with Google. “I wouldn’t expect to see a Google-style DuckDuckGo Classroom anytime soon, but ideally, we’ll have special resources just for educators looking to make a switch,” says spokesperson Allison Goodman.

规模较小的搜索引擎，如注重隐私的DuckDuckGo，看到了从对谷歌感到失望的学校那里赢得业务的机会。“我不指望很快能看到谷歌风格的‘DuckDuckGo课堂’，但理想情况下，我们将为那些寻求转换平台的教育工作者提供专门的资源，”发言人艾莉森·古德曼（Allison Goodman）表示。

Following a federal ruling in 2024 that Google illegally maintained its search monopoly, the company was ordered to share certain search data and services with rivals and loosen restrictions on how its products are distributed. But the effort is well behind schedule, thanks to on

继2024年联邦法院裁定谷歌非法维持其搜索垄断地位后，该公司被勒令与竞争对手共享部分搜索数据和服务，并放宽对其产品分发方式的限制。但由于……（原文中断），这项工作已严重滞后。