Virginia Beach schools initiates business agreement with developer of ChatGPT

VIRGINIA BEACH — The public school system of Virginia’s largest city entered into a contract with the developer of the world’s most popular artificial intelligence model, ChatGPT.

Under the agreement with OpenAI, Virginia Beach schools personnel will have access to a tailored version of the large language model designed to be more secure. It is explicitly not designed for student use. David Din, chief information officer of the school district, said the software will cost nothing to the school system through June 2028.

“This just allowed us an opportunity to bring ChatGPT into a more secure environment, allowed us to put the necessary administrative controls around it so that we knew that staff would be able to have a tool that’s available to them for appropriate use,” he said.

Din said Virginia Beach school officials approached OpenAI seeking a way for teachers to ask ChatGPT questions minding needs for administrative oversight and governance compliant obligations. The educator interface will be nearly identical to the standard version.

Virginia Beach schools is among more than 50 districts spread across the country to maintain a partnership with OpenAI, as of Wednesday. Others include Houston, Baltimore and Boise, Idaho.