Data Centers: Just the Facts - October 9 Friday AI Day Feature
September 15, 2026
Submitted by Jaime Menon
Mark your Calendars - Friday, October 9 · Friday AI Day: Demystifying AI in Extension
Register here: https://ksu.zoom.us/meeting/register/hTnSRUtDQgyBII6JS1toaQ
So far in this series we’ve focused on demystifying the AI you can't see — the models, the prompts, the quiet ethics of an invisible tool.
This month we're flipping that around and looking at the part of AI you absolutely can see: the warehouse-sized buildings rising at the edge of towns…and may be coming to a horizon near you.
You've heard the conversations. Maybe you've been in one — at a coffee shop, a commission meeting, a family dinner. Data centers have a way of filling a room with strong feelings and thin information. Everyone seems to know something. Almost no one seems to know the whole of it.
That's why I’ve engaged Tom Beresnyak. As part of a Penn State Extension team, Tom has walked communities through this exact conversation, and his approach is refreshing, almost radically simple: no advocating for or against. Just honest information that a community needs to make its own call.
This is extension work at its finest, and it's the reason we're bringing him to you.
I’m not going to spoil it here. The whole point of Oct. 9 is that you walk in with questions and leave with a map instead of a megaphone — the kind of clear-eyed footing that lets you tell signal from noise the next time the topic comes up. And it will come up.
Tolkien wrote that "not all those who wander are lost" — but a community wandering into a big, consequential decision without a guide probably is. Tom is a very good guide. And after this session, you'll have the information and tools to be a good guide for your own community, too.
When you register, you’ll be provided a pre survey where you’ll have a chance to provide your questions ahead, and that will give Tom has a chance to incorporate them into his presentation, or have them handy to answer during the presentation, so register early!
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