Bans and bots: a research project on AI in secondary education

On a freezing November morning, with the temperature sitting at a bracing 1°C, I find myself walking down an empty Berlin street, on my way to meet a man called Sven Meth. I arrive at my destination, a graffiti-strewn East German relic of a building. Uncertain I am in the right place, I make my way through to a courtyard. Standing slightly stunned and lost, Sven arrives behind me and welcomes me to the Evangelische Schule Berlin Zentrum, a highly regarded secondary school known globally for its progressive, pupil-led and innovation-based educational philosophy.

I am here to discuss AI.

I’d reached out to Sven a few months prior, alongside a handful of other teachers in exceptional-sounding schools in the UK and Europe, in the hope that a visit to these institutions would proffer valuable insights into the current state of AI in secondary schools.

This inquiry project had its nucleus in a random conversation with Assistant Headmaster (Academic) Ms Leeann Douglas well back in January of 2025. Presented with the beautiful opportunity that is long service leave, I mentioned to Leeann that I had decided to travel to the UK with my partner and young children, hoping to visit a few schools while over there, see where things were at with AI and write down some thoughts. What started as a suggestion for a little overseas study, soon blossomed into a fully fleshed out research project, supported by the School, involving a visit to ten of the UK’s best schools, a side trip to Denmark and Germany, attendance at one of London’s primary AI conferences and the writing of a report that delved deeply into contemporary trends and approaches to AI in the secondary schooling environment.

Pictured: Mr Tim Derricourt standing in the grounds of Merchant Taylors’ School
Pictured in header: City of London School

I was slightly disconcerted by this relaxed attitude, an attitude that seemed at odds with what I had found elsewhere. Weeks earlier, I spent a day at City of London School, sitting on the banks of the Thames and home to such famous alumni as Rowan Atkinson and Daniel Radcliffe. There, they are embracing their “city-ready” philosophy, working to integrate AI frameworks into reports and marking and refining a long-term computing science course, teaching pupils the foundations of computing and concluding with a rich understanding of AI’s potential as a tool. Two hours south of the city, I visited Caterham, a vibrant independent school, leaning right into using AI to develop personalised learning systems for each pupil, while balancing this with robust courses on AI ethics and the cognitive science behind learning itself. In the idyllic surrounds of Winchester College, the scenario was a little more traditional. Within the 14th-century walls, AI was seen as more of a threat to learning, with teenage scholars, dressed in black gowns, telling me over lunch in the dining hall how resorting to it undermined the very purpose of education, an education designed to lead these impressive young people into places like Oxford and Cambridge. The scene was even more traditional at controversial institution Michaela Community School, where AI is completely banned in an environment where pupils are drilled in 30-second timed chunks of learning and “100% attention” is demanded in class “100% of the time”. But more on that another day.

Pictured: The hallowed dining hall of Winchester College

But the experience was broader than that; in being welcomed into these wonderful places, filled with passionate educators, insightful pupils and varied practices, the world of education opened up for me, making me feel almost like that 15-year-old, given a few months to see the world and return with a bigger sense of my place within it.

Pictured: The graffitied walls of Evangelische Schule Berlin Zentrum