Events

“Found In Trans-Lation,” an event for Toledo’s LGBTQIA+ Pride celebration

August 7, 2025 | 3.00-5.00 p.m. Main Branch of the Toledo Lucas County Public Library

ICS collaborates with Better Toledo to host “Found In Trans-Lation,” an event for Toledo’s LGBTQIA+ Pride celebration. This workshop, hosted by Pella Felton and Bryan Bove-Wimberley, will give participants vital tools and knowledge through which they can understand, affirm, and interface with the local transgender population. It will also highlight the work of Toledo nonprofit organizations, connecting participants to the many local resources available to transgender individuals and allies seeking to support this community.

Impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology on nonprofit sector in Northwest Ohio

Oct 29, 2025 | 6.30-8 p.m. Grounds for Thought in Bowling Green

Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT have been used widely by nonprofit and Civil Society Organizations (CSOs). However, most knowledge about AI's use by CSOs is emerging from practitioners' experiences, primarily focused on urban geographies in the U.S. (leaving rural and semi-urban areas). Also, most of the writing on this topic mainly focuses on the positive use of generative AI. It also needs to pay attention to the possible negative impact of this emerging technology on nonprofits and the communities they serve. Thus, more research is needed to understand the impact of generative AI technology by nonprofit and CSO organizations in rural and semi-urban geography in Ohio. I propose to use qualitative research methodology to interview nonprofit executives in Northwest Ohio to understand how they are using this emerging technology to advance their mission and the potential pitfalls or challenges of this technology on the sector and local community served by these nonprofits and CSOs. I anticipate findings from this research will contribute to understanding the implications of emerging technology, such as generative AI, in the nonprofit and CSO sector in Northwest Ohio (beyond the university) and add to the policy debate about the use of generative AI and its impact on local communities served by diverse nonprofit and CSOs.

Server Farming: Community Sustainability and Infrastructures of the Machine Learning Age

Nov 18, 2025 | 6.30-8 p.m. Wood County District Public Library

Often public engagement with infrastructure development projects is under-organized, fractured into seemingly competing interests, and out-positioned by powerful, global economic actors. As Wood County authorizes the construction of its first Internet data center or “server farm,” many questions remain about the local and regional sustainability of such infrastructures. This proposed ICS project’s intends to connect my ongoing research on communities in Northern Virginia (“Internet Capital of the World”) to new research within NW Ohio in order to create a community “playbook” for increasing effective democratic participation in the production of AI technologies and their geographies of infrastructure, resources, and labor. The growing machine learning or “AI” economy relies on an extensive geography of “server farms,” which intensively consume electricity, water, and land, and have special impacts on organized and unorganized labor. Particularly because of the dispersed (trans-local) and “out-of-sight” aspects of sustainability issues, communities often struggle to communicate across the complex and diverse interests that are impacted by these infrastructures. This project will develop an interdisciplinary framework for community dialogues around sustainability and the development of “AI” infrastructure. Focusing on local government, labor institutions, and environmental scientists, this project will use the audio-visual resources of the BGSU School of Media and Communication to create artifacts to inspire and build community awareness and dialogue. These will be the foundation for more cross-campus and inter-community partnerships and collaboration around community sustainability broadly.