(Un)Leveling the Playing Field

Abstract

Artificial intelligence (AI) has been increasingly framed by policymakers and technology companies as a transformative solution to educational inequity, particularly for historically marginalized youth that attend under-resourced, racially segregated schools. Consequently, AI technologies are being adopted and deployed in K-12 institutions at breakneck speeds, often without critical awareness of how anti-Black racism exists as the central organizing logic of both the sociotechnical infrastructures (e.g., code, data, algorithms) and architectures (e.g., formal integration with institutional power structures like law enforcement) of these tools. In order to better understand the academic, socioemotional, and carceral impacts that anti-Black AI systems have on Youth of Color, this article foregrounds the voices and perspectives of 27 Black highschoolers from Southern California and asks them to consider how, if at all, AI mediates their experience with educational equity, access, safety, and opportunity. A qualitative analysis of semi-structured interviews, written reflection papers, small-group video blogs and whole-group class discussions showcases how the proliferation of AI technologies into K-12 schools has actually worked to exacerbate educational disenfranchisement for Black youth, giving rise to synthetic equity gaps—a term introduced to describe how biased sociotechnical systems cause artificial reductions in achievement, opportunity, safety, and inclusion for historically marginalized students.

Citation: Tanksley, Tiera, ‘(Un)Leveling the Playing Field: How AI Creates Synthetic Gaps in Achievement, Opportunity and Educational Equity for Black Students’ (June 6, 2026), in Ebony McGee, Evelyn Hammonds, Dr Thema Monroe-White (eds), The Sciences, Medicine, and Technology, in Meena Dhanda (ed.), Oxford Intersections: Racism by Context (Oxford, online edn, Oxford Academic, 20 Mar. 2025 -), https://doi.org/10.1093/9780198945246.003.0174, [access date].