On Oct. 2, Goshen College rolled out the latest step in their modernization of education — a $38,784 campus-wide yearly subscription, $48 per license, to BoodleBox, a software that combines about 40 AI models into one center for “learning.” 

We have known for a long time that generative AI does not benefit our brains. Dozens of studies, such as a June 2025 study done by MIT, have shown that use of generative AI models is directly linked to loss of critical thinking skills. 

What separated early humans from the rest of the beasts of the world wasn’t our ability to grab onto things —– countless species do so all the time, but I don’t see any orangutan-built skyscrapers —– it was our success in thinking critically.

In the MIT study, researchers found that people who used AI regularly had far less brainpower when compared to those who didn’t. According to the study, “LLM users consistently underperformed at neural, linguistic, and behavioral levels.” And for what? AI helps answer the questions in school, but what do you do when you enter the workforce having learned none of the information?

Sci-fi works from the past portray artificial intelligence as something that does humanity’s menial tasks, freeing humans to pursue art, science and anything else we could dream of. The artificial intelligence we got stuck with does the opposite.

Since the rollout of ChatGPT at the end of 2022, quality essays, drawings and basically everything humans could make became subject to scrutiny purely because of a chance it was made by artificial intelligence. 

AI companies said everything is easier with AI, and they aren’t wrong. Since its adoption, online art became easier to steal, people became easier to scam and privacy became easier to threaten —– all from the use of AI. The CEOs of the companies behind it became superstar billionaires, and funded campaigns to keep them that way —– the Earth be damned. 

But the people fought back. QuitGPT, a viral movement started in late 2025, proved that not only did we have the power, but that the people didn’t want an AI model controlling everything they did. Two and a half million people canceled their ChatGPT subscriptions, costing OpenAI hundreds of millions of dollars. On Feb. 28,  cancellations jumped almost 300%, and one-star reviews for ChatGPT on the app store grew eightfold, according to LumiChats, a platform similar to BoodleBox.

From then on, fewer and fewer people used AI. The anti-AI movement went from small groups of rebels to a bona fide army. Anti-AI sentiments brought communities together and strengthened human connection, something desperately needed in the modern era.

Goshen College is trying to take that away.

Yes, BoodleBox is optional. For now. In an email to students on Oct. 21, the GC Service Desk said that BoodleBox can help you with numerous things, such as clarification for difficult concepts, summarization of readings, role-playing conversations and more (notably all of which can be done by a newfangled invention called “people”), but the final example of what the site can do is the most disturbing. 

“Complete course assignments that require the use of Boodlebox.” This puts GC students in between a rock and a hard place: submit to Sam Altman and his cronies — use BoodleBox to do the assignment and help destroy the environment, or take the zero, waiving your grade for the sake of morals.

What can we do? Colleges across the nation have spent so much time helping us to stick together as a community. Nearly the entirety of campus life is built around getting students to interact with each other — from nearly an entire week of pre-class activities and ICC for first-years at GC to a very public dining hall and so much more. 

Not only that, but GC in particular has been a model for standing up to injustice, shown in 2010 when they played “America the Beautiful” in place of the national anthem. Fox News put us in the spotlight, calling us “un-American.” 

Did we flinch? Did we run into the shadows, capitulating to their demands? No, we did not. 

We held our ground, saying in an online fact sheet that, “Our Christ-centered core value of compassionate peacemaking seems to be in conflict with the anthem’s militaristic language.” 

Yes, we did this to protect our name as an institution, but also to shelter those GC students who were from countries that had possibly been affected by the United States’ near-constant willingness to show off the rockets’ red glare.

I cannot believe that was the same school that rolled onto its back as soon as the AI trend got big.

So why bend a knee now? Maybe it is because of the immense utility generative AI provides. I will not ignore the usefulness of a chatbot. If I need an answer right now, I can pick up my phone and ask Google, and it will give me an answer that is probably correct, one that would have taken me a fair few minutes to find on my own. 

But that’s just it. I saved a couple minutes, and ignored all the people around me who could have helped. Plus, I gave money to the company who has placed massive, unsightly noise generators in impoverished neighborhoods, turning their water into brown goop, and to the CEO who, according to Reuters, sexually assaulted his sister.

I understand why some people want to use AI — and it would be mostly valid if the way it was powered wasn’t actively killing us. For a college as concerned about learning, culture and the environment as GC is, it is a mystery as to why they are pushing its antithesis on everyone.

To everyone reading this: cancel your subscription to all AI models if you have them. Get rid of any AI apps you may have. Encourage your friends to do the same. 

And to the college, end the contract with BoodleBox. Fight the tyranny those 40 AI models help support. Grow a spine again. 

If you want to create a community raised in culture for service, step away from artificial intelligence, and push for the real thing instead.

 

Adam Sherrill is a sophomore broadcasting major with a theater minor. He enjoys photography, specifically trains, bugs and cars.