Remove copilot icon that appears when I click in Onenote

I don't want Microsoft to invite my kids to use AI on their homework every time they move their cursor. We need to have the option of disabling the Copilot. Unless Microsoft isn't serious about the education market.

https://feedbackportal.microsoft.com/feedback/idea/0fae6e48-04d8-ef11-95f5-6045bdb154fd seems to behave differently when clicking from here.

Copy/paste in a new window. Maybe this is more "help" from copilot? Thanks for pointing that out @Alan Staples

Anyone remember Clippy...? The annoying "help" paperclip from the 90's? I think he's back in this new form.

Clippy was never that annoying. He stayed off to the side, and you could right click and turn them off... and they stayed off!

The Copilot junk is being forced on us without any way to even make it less annoying or to have it disabled! I had one machine where it wasn't showing up so I left it... but rolled back my other 2 to a version of office before it... and thinking I need to roll back even farther to completely get rid of it.

I followed those steps, uninstalled copilot from my computer. The copilot icon is still there next to the cursor/when starting a new line.

In one of my earlier posts, I said I had the option of reformatting my PC. I just wanted to report back after trying that. Unfortunately, there was no workflow that allowed me to prevent Copilot from installing in this way into OneNote, Word, etc.. I took every opportunity to suppress all “connected experiences” or whatever they say in Privacy Settings. I immediately uninstalled Copilot after the first boot up. Somehow it made it into my setup. To be clear, when I use OneNote, I see the Copilot icon and yellow banner at the top of the window reminding me of the settings I chose.

Since this was a fresh install, I figured why not try using New Outlook again. When I couldn’t reorder my accounts, I remembered why I had abandoned New Outlook previously and switched to Old Outlook (again). I share this because sometimes I honestly forget how frustrated I’ve been in the past. But the lesson here is that Microsoft’s handling of this Copilot roll-out is consistent with previous roll-outs. However, in this case, it is particularly unsettling how they are pushing Copilot within the app (icon + banner).

I say without a shred of pretense, I am receiving a loaner Mac on Friday of this week and will be trialing Mac OS for the first time in my life after over 30 years of using Windows. I have already begun trialing Linux on another laptop. Based on the number of comments in this thread, I suspect others are feeling similarly. Maybe in the past we’ve eaten our feelings and gone along with it, but this time Microsoft might “find out”, as they say.