Alicia Maldonado-Zahra is a scholar-activist fellow working for Goshen College and the Coalition to Dismantle the Doctrine of Discovery. She teaches courses in the peace, justice and conflict studies department, and works with student protest groups to ensure their voices are heard. She also has gained a reputation within the college as having strong opinions on AI. Through Maldonado-Zahra’s work with the coalition, she has read through research on the environmental impacts of AI data centers. While the coalition is a Christian group, its practices are also rooted in Native American cosmology.  “Mennonites and Native Americans have a lot in...

By John Eash-Scott • October 1, 2026 • Features

On Sept. 22, The Record sent out a survey to understand and analyze data on AI use across campus. During the seven-day open period, 70 students, 31 faculty members and 16 staff members responded to the survey.  Overall, students are more abstinent than faculty and staff. 43% of students said they never use AI, against 19% of faculty and 13% of staff. Only 20% of students use AI somewhat often or frequently, versus 45% of faculty and 50% of staff.  Out of the 70 students who responded, 30 of them claimed to never use AI. The predominance of the “never”...

By Igor Sapucaia • October 1, 2026 • News Josiah Miller • October 1, 2026 • News

President Rebecca Stoltzfus launched the AI Task Force 10 months ago, with the prospect of obtaining a grant from the Lilly Endowment Artificial Intelligence in Higher Education Initiative. She hoped this would lead to further discussions on various ways Goshen College can approach AI.  During these AI Task Force meetings, topics such as having a Statement of Ethics and an AI Policy site for GC came up, among other AI-related conversations.  In a process which started in February, the AI Ethics Workgroup led by Philipp Gollner, professor of history, met multiple times throughout the spring with other faculty members to...

By Hannah Smith • October 1, 2026 • News

The IT department used artificial intelligence to make changes to 95 pages in this first phase of the project, which was completed. The first phase of the project took about three months and was finalized mid September. The refresh included collaboration between the IT department, faculty and students and its objectives were to better showcase what GC has to offer and make the website more interactive for online visitors. “We wanted to make sure that the voice that was being portrayed in each page for different departments was unique,” said Isabel Massud ’26, a part of the project’s team. AI...

By Elena Oborocea • October 1, 2026 • News

Kaitlyn Muns, an image and video aesthetics tutor at SpaceXAI, formerly known as xAI, visited campus on Monday.  Muns spoke in a career planning class taught by Patrick Farran, a professor of business. She then had an informal chat with students. Muns worked in luxury fashion, and was a wardrobe and prop stylist for TV when SpaceXAI reached out to her via LinkedIn. “‘Never miss an opportunity’ is my motto,” she said. Muns encouraged anybody with a passion, like her, to channel that passion into AI. Interests mentioned during the event included animation and photography. “Do the things that make...

By John Eash-Scott • October 1, 2026 • News

On May 15, Pope Leo XIV signed “Magnifica Humanitas,” or “Magnificent Humanity,” his first encyclical, focused on protecting human dignity in the age of artificial intelligence. The Vatican released it on May 25.  In the 42,000-word document, the Pope asked: “Where are we going? Toward what goal do we wish to orient ourselves? What direction should we choose as people and as a human community?” Those questions are becoming more relevant as AI enters personal areas of life, including faith.  Sheri Hostetler, pastor at First Mennonite Church of San Francisco said, “It was becoming increasingly apparent that this technology was...

By Ana Alves Machado • October 1, 2026 • Features

AI has been integrated into every part of daily life, and it felt crucial to mark this moment — a time when it seems each decision has the potential to set our course for at the very least the rest of my lifetime.  The decision to do this issue homecoming weekend was intentional. I want alumni to know what AI looks like at Goshen College, without the filter of the corporate institution. This is the historical record that people will reference when they want to know what GC really looked like as AI first started to boom — the questions...

By Mackenzie P. Miller • October 1, 2026 • Features