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In the nearly four years since generative artificial intelligence began colonizing the academic lives of teens, it has changed the experience of school for millions of young people. Perhaps no group has watched their reality shift more than student journalists.

Just as the technology has rewired the relationship between young writers-in-training and their teachers, it has also changed how student journalists and their editors work together 鈥� or, in some cases, don鈥檛. 

And AI has created headaches for these journalists that mirror those afflicting their professional peers, with school newsrooms struggling to figure out how to respond.

As with their schools more broadly, student newsrooms have spent these years deploying surveillance software and, in many cases, drafting zero-tolerance policies for AI. Different newsrooms have developed different answers to the same basic question: How much do we trust teenagers to not let a chatbot do their work? 

社区黑料 spoke recently to three student journalists from three very different newsrooms about their experiences:

• Cid Frydman, a rising senior at Berkeley High School in California, who writes for the ;
• Veronica Mollod, a rising senior and current events editor at , the student newspaper at the High School of American Studies at Lehman College in the Bronx, N.Y.;
• Tova Weiss, a recent high school graduate in Ann Arbor, Mich., who has split her time between Pioneer High School and . Weiss has written and edited for the and , a publication written by and for Jewish teens.

Here are eight-and-a-half ways 鈥� including one counterintuitive, not-for-attribution observation 鈥� in which AI is changing their realities:

1. In a few schools, AI has overturned the culture of newspapers.

Frydman, the Berkeley student, said strict AI use policies at her publication have bred resentment among student writers. 

鈥淚 think a lot of the people higher up on my paper, and in journalism in general, don’t have a lot of trust in writers anymore, especially with so many AI resources that are out there,鈥� she said. 

Editors are 鈥渧ery harsh on writers鈥� over worries that they鈥檒l use AI, keeping strict controls over documents, she said. They鈥檒l poke around writers鈥� search histories and analyze their typing speed and word choices, matching drafts to previous work. 

鈥淚t’s very strict when you put it all together,鈥� Frydman said. 鈥淭hey don’t have a lot of faith in our ability to actually produce real journalism, and so just assume the worst automatically, which can be a little frustrating when you’re just trying to do your best as a writer.鈥�

At the Berkeley High newspaper, staffers have been let go over suspected AI use. 

Frydman sees the high cost of such heavy-handed policies: 鈥淲e’re here because we love journalism,鈥� she said. 鈥淲e’re here to write about things that we’re hopefully passionate about, and the heavy approach of 鈥楾here’s no tolerance whatsoever,鈥� and not even giving writers the grace and the trust to make their own decisions and do this work on their own 鈥� just minding it and monitoring it so heavily, I think it’s very discouraging.鈥�

More broadly, getting caught using AI to write academic assignments carries weighty consequences, she said. You鈥檙e unable to get a letter of recommendation from any teacher, Frydman said. 

And a single infraction travels fast: Get caught using AI once, she said, and teachers will tell all of their colleagues 鈥渢o watch out because this student has used AI before 鈥� they might use it in your class.鈥�

2. AI is changing how 鈥� and how much 鈥� students write.

Frydman said she鈥檚 adopting what鈥檚 basically a minimalist approach to writing these days, holding back details so she doesn’t draw suspicion from editors or teachers. 

Though she doesn鈥檛 use AI for writing, she said, 鈥淎 lot of times, I find myself sort of slimming down my writing to not go so into detail on things because it鈥檒l be suspected to be something that’s not original. You don’t have a lot of room to be creative in this process, so it’s definitely been a little challenging.鈥�

Ann Arbor鈥檚 Weiss said she鈥檚 also seeing many young journalists 鈥渁djust their writing voice鈥� to avoid being flagged as relying on AI. Many students, she said, now intentionally add typos to their writing to support its legitimacy. 鈥淚t’s absolutely devastating to watch how many people are intentionally damaging or diminishing the quality and authenticity of their work,鈥� she said. 

At Berkeley High, school-issued Chromebooks are locked down to block access to ChatGPT, Claude and other major AI tools outright 鈥� and any attempt to reach them gets flagged. 鈥淚t notifies the teacher through this program that we have called Go Guardian, which is embedded into a lot of the Chromebooks, where they can sort of see what you’re doing and be able to call you out on it,鈥� Frydman said.

3. A few newsrooms are writing AI policies.

At Youth Environmental Press Team, where Weiss is an editor, staffers have been talking 鈥渋n pretty much every director’s meeting鈥� about the implications and problems surrounding AI. 鈥淲e are an environmental publication, which means a lot of us are very climate-conscious.鈥�

The environmental impacts of AI data centers are a cause of great concern, Weiss said.

After fielding a wave of questions from reporters, the publication developed formal guidelines rather than instituting an outright ban on AI. 鈥淚t was always very clear for us that we would not publish or even entertain the idea of publishing anything that was written by a chatbot or any kind of generative AI,鈥� Weiss said. But they soon got queries from reporters asking if they could use AI for outlining, for formatting statistics, for interview transcriptions and the like.

The policy that emerged prohibits AI-written and AI-edited work, including work that heavily uses tools like Grammarly. But transcription services and basic spell-check are still allowed. 

The organization, she said, wants to make writing 鈥渁s accessible as possible so people can have their work published 鈥� but not if that means it’s not really their work, and especially not if that’s at the cost of the environment.鈥� 

4. Other newsrooms rely on experience and vibes.

Weiss helped craft the formal AI policy at the environmental journal. At jGirls+ Magazine, by contrast, she said there鈥檚 no written policy. But in practice the standard is clear: Submissions and even staff applications that appear to be AI-generated are not accepted. In one case, she recalled, an obviously AI-written editorial board application 鈥� with a stiff style that lacked personal voice 鈥� tested with an AI detector as 100% AI, 鈥渨hich was really something none of us had expected.鈥�

Weiss said AI detectors should be used only 鈥渨hen there is already prior reason to suspect something might have been AI generated鈥� 鈥� a student with a track record of misusing AI, for instance, or because something just simply reads a little 鈥渙ff.鈥�

5. In most cases, AI detectors are widely seen as unreliable.

Weiss described a tiered system in the environmental outlet鈥檚 workflow, with writers operating on an 鈥渉onor system鈥� but with student editors flagging 鈥渟ketchy鈥� pieces such as those that are missing statistical sources or those that quote dubious ones 鈥� or writing that doesn’t sound like a typical teenager’s.

鈥淭he thing about student voices is typically each writer has a distinctive style of writing,” she said. 鈥淲e’re high schoolers: We have typos, we make mistakes in there. And if we’re finding something that’s void of personal style or just generally reads in a way that doesn’t seem like it was written by a student, we’re going to look into that further.鈥� 

But she and others worry that using an AI detector could unfairly flag strong writing as suspicious simply because it’s polished 鈥� a phenomenon that happens more than you鈥檇 think in many schools, Weiss suggested.

AI detectors aren’t really reliable, said Frydman, the Berkeley senior, 鈥渟o even if you write something really well, it’ll just automatically assume that it might be AI and your writing will get flagged, which has happened to a lot of my friends.鈥� 

6. A few simple rules can keep AI from taking over, journalists say.

Mollod, the New York City journalist, said a somewhat arcane editing rule at her publication basically serves to help keep AI-generated content at bay: At Common Sense, every article is required to include a quote from a student in each grade level 鈥� a structural feature that makes it hard for AI to intrude, since students typically remember what they鈥檝e said to a reporter. 

7. In a few cases, teachers are using AI more than students.

The journalists described several instances in which teachers, not students, were the ones turning to AI, relying on the technology to formulate lesson plans, create assignments and grade them.

One student who asked not to be quoted directly spoke of a teacher who 鈥渨ill just copy and paste straight off of Chat GPT or Claude, and just give us assignments that are so clearly AI that it’s ridiculous.鈥�

Others rely on it for grading assignments, which 鈥渓eads to a lot of people getting unfair grades, because AI can mess up,鈥� said the student.

The more teachers rely on the technology, 鈥渢he easier it is to just forget that you’re there for a reason, you’re trying to do your job for a reason 鈥� and AI should not be teaching kids Spanish or English or math or anything like that. It can’t reproduce real thinking. So it’s definitely a little dystopian.鈥�

8. For many students, refusing AI isn’t a school rule. It’s personal.

Weiss, the Ann Arbor writer, said she has never used Open AI鈥檚 popular ChatGPT, due to environmental concerns over data centers as well as personal concerns over AI more broadly. 鈥淚t just does not align with my morals at all,” she said. 

But casual AI use has become normalized among many of her peers, she said, with students openly saying, sometimes within earshot of teachers, that they ran an assignment through a chatbot the night before it was due.

The best way to fight AI, she said, is basically to boycott it. 鈥淭he strongest way anyone can combat artificial intelligence is just by refusing to have anything to do with it,鈥� she said.

While AI-generated writing more broadly can damage the way that people learn and is worth thinking about, Mollod said, she鈥檚 not sure that it has gotten to the point where 鈥渏ust everyone is just cheating, and no one’s really actually taking their work seriously.鈥�

She reads the coverage and believes most people who don鈥檛 spend time in schools overestimate how much teens use AI. 鈥淧eople not in school are like, 鈥榃ell, I didn’t have this great tool. If I had it, I wouldn’t have done anything,鈥欌�� she said. But relying on the technology, which showed up in the middle of her eighth-grade year, isn鈥檛 yet common practice for most students she knows. 

Whether future students will warm to it more isn鈥檛 yet clear, Mollod said.

Weiss, the Michigan student, said her work 鈥� especially at the environmental publication 鈥� has taken on a new significance in the age of AI, pushing to celebrate and highlight 鈥渁uthentic youth journalism and youth narrative鈥� in the face of encroaching technology. 鈥淚n my view,鈥� she said, 鈥渄emonstrating our talents as humans and as youth is a form of silent protest against AI by proving that artificial intelligence isn’t necessary to produce professional-quality journalism.鈥�

Bonus: Non-AI cheating abides. 

On background, one of the students said she thought a lot of the news coverage about AI cheating, while serious, simply misses the point. The old-fashioned kind of cheating, for now, remains much more common. In 2026, students are still relying on copying each other’s homework, just as generations before them did. 

鈥淢ostly it’s just, like, circles of people, where there’ll be a math class and five people do the homework 鈥� and the other 20 got it from this person, [who] got it from this person, [who] got it from this person 鈥� which has always kind of been going on.鈥�

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