AI Companies Are Usurping Parental Authority in Schools Through Algorithmic Value Systems
Source: Joshua Van Lange. "How Developers Are Making AI Your Kid's Third Parent At School." February 20, 2026. thefederalist.com
The Gist
The author argues that big tech companies are essentially becoming a third parent to schoolchildren by programming AI tools with their own values and deploying them widely in classrooms without asking parents for permission. He believes this undermines parental authority and gives Silicon Valley executives inappropriate control over how children are taught and what values they absorb.
Conclusion
AI companies have assumed parental-like authority over children in schools by embedding their own value systems into educational AI tools, bypassing parental consent and control
Premises
- AI companies explicitly describe their role in parental terms, with CEOs comparing AI to parents and their value-programming process to parental guidance
- Major AI companies have partnered directly with teachers unions to deploy AI tools to millions of students without requiring parental permission or involvement
- AI systems are programmed with 'constitutional' value frameworks created by small groups of Silicon Valley developers, not parents or local communities
- Parents have no meaningful ability to opt out of or review AI tools that are now embedded throughout school curricula
- Tech executives send their own children to low-tech schools while promoting AI integration in public schools for other people's children
- AI tools are already undermining educational goals by doing students' work for them rather than helping them learn
Assumptions
- Parents have a fundamental right to control their children's moral and educational formation
- AI systems inherently carry and transmit the values of their creators
- The current regulatory framework is inadequate to protect parental rights in educational technology
- There is a meaningful distinction between AI as a tool versus AI as an authority figure
- Local parental control is preferable to centralized corporate control over children's education