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By Indra Kubicek
This op-ed was originally published in the Montreal Gazette on June 15, 2026.
In a secondary school classroom somewhere in Canada right now, a student is using ChatGPT to draft an essay. Down the hall, a teacher is trying to decide whether to allow it, ban it or find a third option nobody has written a policy for yet. And at home that evening, a parent is sitting across the kitchen table from that same child, wondering whether the information coming back from the screen is accurate, safe or even real.
None of them received formal education for this moment. All of them are living it anyway.
Canada's new AI for All strategy is an important step. More importantly, it reflects what Quebecers and Canadians said during consultation: they want AI governed by Canadian values, not productivity targets alone. Trust, not speed, will inevitably be the measure of long-term success. That framing matters, and it reflects years of work by educators, civil society organizations and communities who have been making exactly that argument.
The renewal of federal funding for digital literacy and AI skills programming for youth — through CanCode — deserves particular attention. CanCode worked. It built digital literacy infrastructure across the country, reached underserved communities, and demonstrated that non-profit organizations are not only capable of delivering at a national scale, they are the right organizations to do it. Communities trust them. Extending that model to AI, from kindergarten to Grade 12, is the right call. We know this because organizations across Canada, including Montreal-based Digital Moment, have been delivering it successfully for years.
The strategy is ambitious. The question is whether the scale matches the moment. The strategy sets a target of training more than 3,000 educators with AI learning resources. Digital Moment trained 4,700 educators last year alone — and more than 35,000 over the course of our work. The target is important, but it should be a starting point, not a finish line.
Teachers agree. The Canadian Teacher's Federation, representing more than 370,000 educators, welcomed the strategy, but warned that training just 3,000 teachers is not enough to move the needle on AI literacy.
The evidence is already in the government's own strategy. According to a global study cited in AI for All, Canada ranks 44th of 47 countries on AI training and literacy. Fewer than one in four Canadians report having received any AI training at all. The gap between where Canadians are today and where this strategy needs them to be is not a future challenge. It is the condition of every classroom in the country right now.
AI literacy cannot be reduced to teacher training alone. This is not about encouraging kids to embrace chatbots. It reaches the student evaluating what an algorithm tells her, the teacher navigating responsible use without a roadmap, the parent trying to guide a conversation they were never prepared for, and the Indigenous education authority whose community has a distinct and consequential relationship to how AI is built and governed. Teachers cannot do this work alone, and they shouldn't have to. Real AI literacy happens across formal and informal learning spaces: in libraries, community centres and conversations that connect learning to young people's actual lives.
We educate our children not only to prepare them for work, though that matters enormously. We educate them to help them thrive. Today, thriving means being equipped for a world shaped by AI.
This means keeping kids safe and giving them the tools to participate as citizens, not just consumers. Algorithmic systems are already making decisions about credit, housing and opportunity. Misinformation spreads faster than fact-checking can follow. Deepfakes are already manipulating elections. Young people live inside these systems every day, often without the critical thinking to recognize it. They need the skills to recognize misinformation. These are not separate conversations. The skills that help a young person evaluate an AI-generated image — to ask who made this, why and whether to trust it — are the same skills that help them navigate a job, a ballot and an application form.
The strategy rightly identifies libraries and community organizations as natural delivery partners. That infrastructure exists. Digital Moment has spent a decade building it: classroom lesson plans, family guides and community-based resources designed to meet Canadians where they already learn and talk: in schools, libraries and community centres. A partnership with the Canadian Commission for UNESCO has extended that work into a youth-led international conversation about living and learning with AI in everyday life. This is not a proposal. It is already built.
Canada listened when Canadians said they wanted AI that reflects their values. The next step is ensuring the delivery matches the declaration: that AI for All reaches youth in every classroom, at every kitchen table, and in every community.
Indra Kubicek is the CEO of Digital Moment, a national digital literacy charity based in Montreal.
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