New York school district pauses AI robot teaching assistant after backlash

Salamanca schools paused plans for a humanoid robot teaching aide after backlash over a $58,000 AI assistant named Sally that had been pitched for classrooms in western New York. The project had been set for Salamanca High School, which serves roughly 500 students, and was meant to start in the fall.

Realbotix described the pilot as its first humanoid robot and AI teacher assistant deployment in a U.S. school district. The company said students helped shape Sally as a young female with dark hair and an upbeat personality, and later reporting said the robot would have silicone skin and long brown hair, giving it a lifelike appearance. It was intended for 11th- and 12th-grade students, with a role that included answering questions, demonstrating lessons and making classes more interactive.

That design choice became part of the controversy. The robot’s female presentation, paired with a company known for making sex dolls, drew sharp criticism from the New York State United Teachers, which said such a machine had no place in classrooms. The pushback turned a local technology trial into a broader fight over who gets to decide when artificial intelligence belongs in public education, and whether families and teachers were being asked to accept a classroom tool they had not meaningfully chosen.

By July 24, Salamanca schools were rethinking the plan amid the scrutiny. The pause left unresolved how the district would balance experimentation with the trust issues that surfaced once the robot moved from a tech pitch to a real school setting. For a district serving a small student body in western New York, the episode became a national example of how quickly classroom A.I. can collide with concerns about consent, appearance and the role of human teachers.