An assistant teaching professor of information technology at the satellite campus in Schuylkill Haven, Gardner uses AI to improve his writing, to make his instruction more interesting, to create assignments, to design classroom activities that increase social interaction, and to figure out how to deliver course material in different ways.
“I use it all the time,” he said.
So while students in his information technology and cybersecurity classes will soon use AI in their careers, so too will students across all majors in different ways, he said.
That is why high schools and colleges throughout Schuylkill County and across the region are hustling to weave AI instruction into all types of courses to keep pace with the rapid advancements occurring in technology.
“Penn State is all in on the AI revolution,” Gardner said. “We know that it’s going to impact everybody in some way.”
Part of the adjustment to AI instruction is setting rules for appropriate use of the technology, a process that local schools have spent the last few years on.
“Each of our teachers is letting students know what level of AI assistance is acceptable. They’re telling them ‘this is what you can and can’t do,’” said Shannon Brennan, Schuylkill Technology Center assistant executive director and director of career and technical education.
Teaching students how to cite what information they present came from AI is part of that protocol, as is a stress on not plagiarizing material while using AI to assist with their own original work.
'JOBS THAT DON'T EXIST YET'
Technological advancements have helped spur a resurgence in students seeking technical instruction, as Schuylkill Technology Center is seeing, Brennan said.
About 815 students now attend STC’s campuses in Frackville and Mar Lin, and another 150 are on the waiting list, she said.
The school strives to be agile in how it adjusts its instruction, knowing how quickly things are evolving, she said.
“Technology has completely changed the face of trade schools,” she said. “AI and technology advancements affect everything we do.”
The school is embracing that technology for its students, as difficult as that is.
“We’re training students for jobs that don’t exist yet,” she said.
In some fields, AI and robotics are replacing workers, which has made it especially important to train students to develop lifelong learning habits, creativity, and complex problem solving and critical thinking skills, so they are ready to adjust to a changing workforce, she said.
There are also specific trades that will benefit from the AI revolution, she said.
Data centers must carefully control temperatures to keep computers operating properly, so those facilities will need the HVAC students that STC is training, she said.
Other technologies, such as the computers that automotive repair students use to diagnose problems in vehicles, have also become crucial to STC programs.
“We’re all looking at what AI and technology can do, and how we can use it to train teachers and students to benefit them,” she said.
RESPONSIBLE USE
The North Schuylkill School District’s approach to AI and emerging technology was to first prepare teachers to lead responsible student use, said Dr. Robert Ackell, superintendent.
“This past fall we held a district-wide AI in-service that gave staff a balanced ‘good, bad, and ugly’ view,” he said. “The training paired with practical, classroom-ready examples.”
At the secondary level, North Schuylkill allows students to use AI in ways that mirror how it’s used in college and the workforce, he said.
“Students learn how to use AI to generate ideas, revise writing, analyze information, support debate and problem-solving, and even assist with coding,” he said. “Just as important, we teach academic integrity, originality, and the habit of evaluating AI outputs rather than accepting them at face value.
“As careers and required skills shift rapidly, preparing students is more complex than it used to be, so we’re continuing to move from teaching isolated facts toward teaching critical thinking, adaptability, digital literacy, and responsible interaction with tools.”
Teacher conversations with students are more important now than ever, he said.
“They give us the clearest window into how a student is thinking, not just what answer they produced, and they help us confirm understanding and maintain academic integrity by ensuring the work reflects the student’s own reasoning,” he said.
Shenandoah Valley School District is still in the early stages of integrating AI as a resource for classroom instruction, first focusing on building staff understanding and awareness of AI fundamentals, said Superintendent Brian Waite.
Other recent technologies are already in use, such as translation tools to support multilingual learners and help newcomers access classroom instruction.
Also, Shenandoah students begin coding and STEM exploration in elementary school. Fourth graders start coding in the school’s STEM lab, and by sixth grade, students program robots and use a hands-on platform to build skills in coding, robotics, design, and problem-solving.
Technology instruction continues and grows more advanced as students continue through middle and high school.
To help ensure students are using those technologies appropriately, digital citizenship and online safety also begin in fourth grade. Social media awareness, and the importance of working with parents when accessing online platforms, are part of that instruction.
“Technology has always influenced education and the workforce,” Waite said. “What has changed is the speed of innovation. Our responsibility is to safely and effectively connect new technologies to student learning.”
'THE QUICKENING'
Alvernia University’s CollegeTowne campus in downtown Pottsville has also been moving quickly to incorporate AI into its training, said senior vice-president and provost Leamor Kahanov, and vice-president for graduate and adult education Gaetan Giannini.
In the nursing courses taught in Pottsville, for example, students use AI to learn how to diagnose symptoms in patients while still paying attention to feedback from the human in front of them, Kahanov said.
This fall, Alvernia will be starting an AI and technology degree program on its main campus in Reading, and is updating other classes to tailor AI into the instruction, she said.
“We’re threading it through all of our majors,” Giannini said. “We want all of our students to be literate in AI.”
Kahanov called it “the quickening” as she referred to how fast AI instruction is being rolled out.
EVER-EVOLVING
Gardner said that some fields, like computer programming, are likely to see AI replace some of the workforce.
But other fields will need graduates with up-do-date technical skills to operate those AI systems, he said.
He urged all students to study how AI will affect their careers so they are prepared to begin that work after graduation.
Traditional science fields, like chemistry, for instance, will progressively add AI, he said.
There are negatives to the new technology, he said, pointing to the potential for students to pass off AI writing or computer code as their own work. Even more malicious is the use of deepfakes to hurt people, he said.
But that is how technology has always evolved, he said.
“Someone will always find a bad way to use something that was intended for good,” he said.
© 2026 the Republican & Herald (Pottsville, Pa.). Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
