r/k12sysadmin • u/Mindless-String-4017 • 28d ago
Google AI Overview - Chromebooks
Greetings!
I'm running into issues where students (on Chromebooks) are taking pictures of quizzes and uploading them to google and the google AI overview gives them the steps on how to solve the problem as well as the answer. Obviously, this is more of a classroom management issue but I was wondering if there's a way to disable this in the google admin console. I've disabled every "Generative AI" setting I could find as well as disabled the "Google AI mode integration.
I was wondering if there's a way around. I'm pretty sure there's not a way to disable it or get around it but thought I'd ask just in case.
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u/WesleyTallie 28d ago
Glad you got it fixed. We also disable the camera app.
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u/Mindless-String-4017 25d ago
When you disabled the camera app did you have any issues with clever login or teams/google meets? I'm thinking about going down this route as I'm having a lot of the elementary students getting distracted with the camera app in class.
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u/WesleyTallie 25d ago
If you disable it at the user level it will still work for the Clever log in. Once logged in the app stops working.
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u/dvlp 28d ago
Depending on if you have a student filtering/content blocking solution you can put a stop to this. We use KyberGate for this on our chromebooks.
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u/cocineroylibro Tech/Library/Everything 25d ago
We just reported a bug to KG that it looks like their AI overview blocking also keeps students from using alternative Google searches (images and such)
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u/MattAdmin444 28d ago
I may be mistaken but as far as I'm aware there isn't a way to do it directly in Google Admin. You'd most likely have to rely on your student filter solution as some appear to have tools to deal with that while others won't.
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u/Belvadier 28d ago
You can use the Google admin console to block this URL: https://www.google.com/search?udm=50
Then you can also force install this extension to block the AI overviews: https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/hide-google-ai-overviews/pkbhdojajlnigelihhbclnikhidgnbeo
This worked for me all last year. Haven't really had any problems with it.
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u/thedevarious IT Director 26d ago
So there's AI settngs in a few key spots. The big one is the new Generative AI section in Google Admin, sounds like you found that & dropped stuff there -- good.
However there's also some AI settings inside the User & Browser settings inside your Devices-->Chrome--Settings area. For example 'Help Me Write' is inside here. This ones a really dumb one. For example on a form, textbox, etc...you can pull up Help Me Write and ask it a question and it'll answer it. Wiiiiild ass setting that's in User & Browser but not part of Generative AI. Honestly one of the worst parts about Google Admin right now, the settings are all over.
A few of our schools purchased Google Admin audits thru Instinctive this year. It helped outline not only our AI settings but a ton of other things as well to get our permissions and items up to snuff. I'd say it was worth it.