Gemini is free in every Google Workspace for Education edition and says school-account data is not used to train models; ChatGPT for Teachers is free to verified US K-12 staff through June 2028; Canva Education, MagicSchool Free, Brisk Free and Khanmigo's teacher tools are free to individual teachers, each on its own data terms.
Free does not mean covered by your school's agreement. The same product can sit under a school-managed contract, a district agreement or a teacher's personal sign-up, and the data terms differ between them. The useful question for a leader is not "which tool is best" but "which route are my staff using to reach it, and what may go in".
Six offers, who qualifies, and what each says it does with data
I read each vendor's own pages on 4 November 2026. The table records what the pages say, not what I assume. Where a page is silent, I say so, because silence is what you would chase with an email.
| Offer | Free for | What its page says about data | What the page leaves unsaid |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gemini (with Gemini in Classroom) | All Google Workspace for Education editions, free of charge; available to users of all ages, with stricter content policies under 18 | Data is not human reviewed or used to train AI models when users sign in with a Workspace for Education account | Default on or off state per age group; the Classroom controls sit on a separate admin page |
| ChatGPT for Teachers | Verified teachers, staff, leaders and administrators at an accredited US K-12 school or district; free through June 2028; not for students | Not used to train models by default, as with other Business customers; automated safety classification may apply; a student data privacy agreement is offered in sign-up | Pricing after the free period is open ("may introduce or adjust") |
| MagicSchool Free | Individual teachers; 80+ teacher tools, Raina chatbot, Quizzes | Lists FERPA, COPPA, SOC 2 and GDPR compliance and Common Sense privacy certification on all tiers; a custom data privacy agreement only on the custom-priced Enterprise plan | No statement on training or retention on the pricing page; those sit in its privacy policy and trust centre |
| Brisk Free | Teachers, at $0; paid tiers are custom-priced for schools | Says it does not use student or teacher data to train or fine-tune models, does not sell data, and does not keep student work after a task completes; lists a data processing addendum and a student data processing addendum among its resources | It does keep basic teacher details and what you type into it, by its own list; no retention period or subprocessor list on the privacy centre page |
| Canva for Education | K-12 educators, their students and qualified districts; verify with an education email or proof of employment | States Canva never uses student data to train AI models | Retention and subprocessor details; verification takes a few days |
| Khanmigo | Educators aged 18 or over in supported countries; learner access is a paid subscription or comes through a district partnership | Says it is built to keep your work and student data private and secure | No statement on training, retention or human review on the page I read |
Two things stand out. Only one of the six, Gemini in a Workspace for Education account, is a school-administered route by default, because the school's Google admin controls who gets it. The rest begin with a teacher signing up, which is exactly where school data starts to move under terms nobody reviewed.
The four questions that sort every offer
Instead of reading six privacy policies cold, run each offer through four questions. They are in order of how often a school gets caught out.
- Who is the account holder? The school (through an admin console or domain claim), the district, or the teacher personally? If it is the teacher, the school has no control over deletion, retention or what happens when they leave.
- Does the content train models? You need a sentence on the vendor's own page. "Not used to train our models by default" is an answer; a marketing line about "privacy first" is not.
- How long is it kept and who else touches it? Look for retention periods, deletion on request and a subprocessor list. ChatGPT for Teachers states that stored conversations are accessible only to authorised staff for support, abuse investigation and legal compliance, and to bound contractors for abuse review. That is the sort of specific answer to look for.
- Can the school sign something? A student data privacy agreement, a data processing addendum, or a district contract. MagicSchool restricts its custom agreement to its Enterprise plan. ChatGPT for Teachers presents a student data privacy agreement during workspace set-up.
Filled in for one offer
Take ChatGPT for Teachers as an example of a completed row. Account holder: the teacher creates it, but a district can claim its domain, configure single sign-on and invite staff, so a district route exists. Training: not by default. Retention and access: limited access list on the help page; I found no fixed retention period there, so ask. Agreement: a student data privacy agreement shown at workspace creation. Verdict: acceptable for staff use under a district workspace; ask for retention in writing before pupil work goes in.
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Buy nowGemini: the one a school administrator already controls
If your school runs Google Workspace for Education, Gemini and Gemini Notebook are included in all editions free of charge. The admin console lets you manage access to both and control how long chats are saved in users' accounts. Under-18 users get stricter content policies and an AI literacy onboarding experience. The page states the data is not human reviewed or used to train AI models when people sign in with their Workspace for Education account.
Three checks remain for the administrator. Confirm whether the setting is on or off for each organisational unit, since I could not confirm defaults from the page. Check Gemini in Classroom separately, because it has its own "manage access" page. Last, find out what staff do on a personal Google account, which has different terms.
A worked scenario: a secondary school with 90 staff
Say a secondary school runs Google Workspace for Education and the head of IT sets Gemini on for staff, off for pupils under 16 and on for students aged 16 to 18. Teachers see it in their school accounts, nothing was bought, and the data stays inside the school's tenant terms. This is the simplest rollout of the six and it is the template for the others: one admin switch, one organisational unit per age group, one written rule on what may be pasted.
ChatGPT for Teachers: free to a specific person, not a school
This offer is free to verified educators at an accredited US K-12 school or district: teachers, staff, school leaders and district administrators. Verification runs through the educator verification page with a school email address. Each workspace is limited to verified educators in the same district, and the plan is not for students. After the free period, which the help page gives as June 2028, pricing may change with advance notice. Some third-party coverage still cites June 2027, so cite the help page and give its date.
For a school outside that eligibility, the offer is simply closed, and the honest answer to a staff member who asks is "it is not available to us". Do not let staff work around verification.
Teacher tools that start with one teacher
MagicSchool Free, Brisk Free, Canva Education and Khanmigo's teacher tools all begin at the individual level. That is good for trying things and awkward for governance. A practical middle route is a short approved list.
- MagicSchool. Its free tier, which it calls forever free, covers the 80+ teacher tools. Student rooms and the 50+ student tools sit on the paid Plus and Enterprise plans, and the custom data privacy agreement comes only with the custom-priced Enterprise plan. So free-tier use should stay on teacher-side material with no pupil names.
- Brisk. The free plan is for teachers, and the school and district plans are custom-priced. Its privacy centre says it logs teachers out after 30 days of inactivity, encrypts data and does not store student work after a task is done. It lists name, email, tools used and what you type as what it does collect, and it offers a data processing addendum and a student data processing addendum, so ask which one covers a free teacher account.
- Canva. It commits that Canva Education stays free for K-12 educators and their students, and says it never uses student data to train AI models. Districts can add single sign-on.
- Khanmigo. Teachers aged 18 or over in supported countries can sign up free. Learners pay, or access comes through a district partnership. Check whether the teacher tools process pupil names before anyone uses them with marking.
A scoring sheet a head teacher can fill in an afternoon
Use one row per tool and score each of the five columns 0 (unknown), 1 (partial) or 2 (clear on the vendor's page). Illustrative scores for a small primary school with 12 staff:
| Tool | School-controlled account | No training stated | Retention stated | Agreement available | Total of 8 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gemini in school Workspace | 2 | 2 | 1 (chat history setting) | 1 | 6 |
| Canva Education via district | 1 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 4 |
| A free teacher chatbot, personal sign-up | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
The scores are invented to show how the sheet works. Set a rule before you start: below 5, no pupil information goes in; 5 to 6, anonymised pupil information only; 7 or more, pupil information may go in under the agreement. Then email the vendor about every zero.
An email to a vendor that gets answers
Subject: Data questions before staff use [product] at our school
Hello,
Some of our staff would like to use [product] with school material. Please confirm in writing:
1. Is content entered by staff or pupils used to train or improve any model?
2. How long is content retained, and how can we have it deleted?
3. Which subprocessors handle it, and where is it stored?
4. Is a data processing or student data agreement available for a free account?
5. Do you human-review any conversations, and when?
We will keep your reply with our records.
[your name], [role], [school]Vendors answer a numbered list faster than a paragraph, and the replies go in a folder you can show a governor or inspector. If a vendor will not answer question 4 for a free account, treat the free account as personal use.
Where personal sign-ups leave the school exposed
A realistic one: a teacher signs up to a free tool with a personal email and pastes a class list with notes on pupils with additional needs to generate seating plans. Nothing visibly goes wrong. Months later a parent asks which companies hold their child's data, and the school cannot say. The fix is a one-line rule ("no named pupil data in any tool not on the approved list") and a list that is short enough to remember.
A second: the school approves a tool and a promotional end date passes. Staff keep using the free account while the terms change. Put the end date or commitment wording into the register and set a calendar reminder for it.
A third: a district signs up for a teachers' workspace but SCIM or invitations leave out part-time staff, who then sign up personally. Test access with one user who should have it and one who should not; OpenAI's own help page suggests starting directory sync with a small pilot group and removing a test user to confirm their access goes.
Pupils as users: the age question comes before the tool question
Most free offers here are teacher-side. Pupil use changes the checklist, because you are now the adult responsible for a child's data and for what the child sees. The six pages treat pupils very differently. Google states Gemini is available to users of all ages, with stricter content policies and a youth onboarding experience with AI literacy resources for under-18s. Khanmigo says learners under 18 get access through a parent's account or a district partnership. Canva Education covers K-12 students as well as educators, and says it never uses student data to train AI models. ChatGPT for Teachers is explicitly not for students, and MagicSchool's student tools sit on paid plans.
So the order is: decide the youngest age group you would let near an AI tool, find which tools and which accounts support that age, and only then compare features. A school that starts with features ends up with a tool no pupil group is allowed to use.
A scenario: a school trial with one year group
Picture a school of 600 pupils that wants one class of 13- and 14-year-olds to use an AI tutor for revision. The leader's checklist runs as follows. Account: school-managed, so Gemini through the school's Workspace or a district-contracted tool. Age: the class is under 18, so use the version with stricter content settings and switch the admin setting on for that organisational unit only. Data allowed: pupil work yes, names and personal details no. Letter: tell parents which tool, what it keeps, and who to ask. Review: check the transcript settings after four weeks. The trial is one class and one tool, and the answers are written down before it starts.
When a teacher leaves with the account
A practical hole in personal sign-ups is departure. A teacher who built two years of resources and prompts in a personal free account takes them when they leave, and the school cannot see or delete anything. With a school-managed workspace the owner or admin controls membership. OpenAI's help page describes owners and admins managing members, roles and settings, plus domain claiming that can route staff with matching emails into a district workspace. Whatever the tool, put one line in the leaver checklist: "move shared resources to the school drive, then close or transfer any AI account used for work".
A paragraph for parents that you can adapt
Parents tend to ask three things: what tool, what happens to my child's information, and who do I ask. A short notice answers all three without alarm. Illustrative wording:
Staff may use approved AI tools to prepare lesson materials. We do not enter pupils' names or personal details into any tool that has not been checked and approved by the school. Pupils use AI tools only in school-managed accounts, in lessons set up by their teacher. The tools we use say they do not use school accounts' content to train their models. Questions can be sent to [name, role]. We review the list of approved tools every term.Only write the training sentence if every approved tool has it in writing from the vendor. That is why the register's "no training stated" column exists. If one tool lacks it, either drop it or edit the sentence so it is true.
A termly review that takes thirty minutes
Terms and plans change, so the register needs a short routine more than it needs a long policy. Once a term, one named person does these four things:
- Open each approved tool's own pricing or terms page and compare it with the date in the register. Note any change in eligibility, free period or data wording.
- Ask staff, without blame, which other AI tools they have started using. Add any that touch pupil or family information to the checking list.
- Pull the account list from each school-managed tool and remove leavers.
- Record the outcome in one line per tool: unchanged, changed (what), or removed.
An illustrative example of a line: "Canva Education: checked 12 January; page still states free for K-12 educators and students; no change." That is a sentence you can show a governor in ten seconds.
What not to trust when a vendor says compliant
MagicSchool's pricing page lists FERPA, COPPA, SOC 2 and GDPR as compliant on every tier, and Brisk cites a Common Sense Privacy Rating. These are useful signals. They are not the same as a signed agreement with your school. A compliance claim on a marketing page describes the vendor's own view of its product. The agreement, the privacy policy and the retention statement bind it. Read the claim as a prompt for which document to ask for, and ask for that document.
Handing this to governors in one page
A governor or board paper needs the register, not the table: tool, route (school-managed or personal), date checked, data allowed, owner. Add one line on each offer's end date or commitment. For wording the policy that sits behind it, how to write an AI usage policy gives a base, and what to check in an AI tool's privacy policy and terms goes deeper on the reading itself. The same questions suit any supplier that touches personal data; questions to ask before buying AI that touches client data is the longer list.
For the office side of a school, five office jobs and what each costs shows where AI helps staff before it ever touches pupil work, and rolling out an AI policy so staff follow it covers getting the register used. If you want someone to go through the list of tools in your own school with you, that is what my AI implementation consultation covers. The AI guide collects the rest of the series.
Questions school leaders ask about free AI offers
Is a free AI tool safe to use with pupil data?
Only if the terms say so for the account type you will use. A teacher's personal free account, a school-managed account and a district agreement can have different data terms for the same product. Check the training statement, retention, subprocessors and whether a student data agreement is available, then decide what pupil information may go in.
Why does a free offer have an end date?
Some free offers are time-limited promotions and some are standing commitments. ChatGPT for Teachers is free through a stated date, after which pricing may change with notice. Canva states it will keep its education plan free for K-12 educators and students. Record the end date or commitment wording in your register.
Should teachers sign up on their own?
Individual sign-ups put school data under terms the school never reviewed. Where a school-managed route exists, such as a Workspace admin console or a district workspace, point staff there. If you allow personal accounts, write down what may and may not be pasted into them.
What is the quickest check on any vendor?
Open its privacy page and find four things: whether content trains models, how long it is kept, who else processes it, and whether the school can sign a data agreement. If any answer is missing from the page, email the vendor and keep the reply.
Further reads
- Does a Five-Person Business Really Need an AI Policy? — Whether a small organisation needs a written AI policy.
- Is Gemini Free for Schools? What Is Included and What Costs Extra — What Gemini includes free for schools and what costs extra.
- AI Audit for Schools: A Checklist to Find Which Tools Staff Use — Find which AI tools staff already use before approving any.
- AI Implementation in Schools: A One-Term Plan for a Small School — A one-term plan for bringing AI into a small school.
- AI Training for School Staff: Session Plan, Tasks and Handout — A staff session plan to go with the approved list.
- AI Chatbot for a School Website: Parent FAQs From Your Handbook — A parent-facing chatbot built from your own handbook.
- AI Consultant for Schools: Role, Cost and How to Brief One — A head's guide: the four jobs a consultant does, published price bands, a one-page brief and questions to ask referees.
- Can AI Draft a Headteacher Report to Governors From Your Data? — Turn anonymised attendance, progress and finance tables into a governors' report draft, with a figure-by-figure accuracy check before it goes out.
- Can AI Write School Attendance Letters? A Three-Stage Sequence — A three-stage attendance letter ladder written by AI with placeholders only, merged from the register by your office, and signed off by the head.
- School Trip Letter to Parents: The Whole Pack, Drafted by AI — One trip brief in, four documents out: parent letter, consent slip, medical form and kit list, with voluntary-contribution wording and a leader checklist.
- AI Tools and AI Development: The Complete 2026 Guide — the AI hub, including every tutorial in the AI-for-business series.
Sources: OpenAI Help Center article on ChatGPT for Teachers; Google's quickstart guide to Gemini and Gemini Notebook for Education and its Gemini for Education page; MagicSchool pricing page; Brisk plans and privacy centre pages; Khanmigo site (all read 4 November 2026); Canva Education page (archived copy of 26 October 2026).