Virginia Beach City Public Schools educators will have access to ChatGPT for Teachers, a version of the popular chatbot designed for districts.
The division joins a new cohort of 55 school systems nationwide partnering with OpenAI, the company announced Wednesday. The company works with about 100 districts in total. As part of the group, districts can learn from each other and get training from OpenAI.
The program is for teachers and staff, not students.
“Our goal with this initiative is to give educators the tools, trust, training and voice to decide when AI is useful, when it is not, and how it can support learning for students without replacing the human relationships and professional judgment at the center of school,” said Leah Belsky, the vice president of education at OpenAI.
ChatGPT for teachers is a secure environment, meaning OpenAI doesn’t use the data to train its large language model, she said. The data is protected, and districts can control and monitor the information. Districts also can assign different users various access levels and use content filters.
Virginia signed a National Data Privacy Agreement through the Student Data Privacy Consortium that allows the state, rather than individual districts, to negotiate privacy requirements.
VBCPS is "committed to embracing emerging technologies in a way that is responsible, secure, and aligned with the needs of our students and staff," spokesperson Nicole Livas said in an emailed statement.
About 7,600 employees in the division were using ChatGPT on their own. The free partnership allows them to use ChatGPT with additional safeguards.
"Through our work with OpenAI, we are able to provide staff with access to ChatGPT while applying appropriate security, privacy and administrative controls across the organization," Livas said. "This allows us to establish clearer expectations for responsible use, better protect division information and provide employees with a consistent and supported AI resource."
ChatGPT for Teachers features include voice mode, image generation, data analysis, web search and research capabilities, and access to the GPT chatbot.
Other districts use the program for a variety of tasks, such as analyzing student data and creating flyers. Houston (Texas) ISD uses it to streamline district curriculum and summarize individualized education programs for students with disabilities, said Christina Masick, who oversees IT for the school system.
“Our biggest goal really is to make sure that AI is really another tool in our professional toolbox,” she said, “making sure that we help people understand that if you use AI ethically and responsibly, it can truly transform the way that we think about problem solving and help you become more effective in how you use your time.”
A 2025 Gallup poll found six in 10 teachers reported using an AI tool for their work, including to make quizzes, analyze data and do administrative work. They estimated it saved them about six hours of work a week.
The increasing use of AI has raised environmental and ethical concerns. And international AI experts asked by MIT and the University of Queensland to evaluate AI risks said dangerous capabilities, competitive pressures, weapons and cyberattacks, concentrated power, and false information are the most likely to produce the most severe harms over the next five years.
Virginia Beach City Public Schools is a member of the Hampton Roads Educational Telecommunications Association, which holds WHRO’s license.
