Independent journalist and educator Jennifer Berkshire looks at the links between data centers and public education.
Did you know that nearly 1,900 public schools sit within a mile of an existing data center or a future facility that’s been approved? Shout out to the 74’s Linda Jacobson for her eye-opening coverage of how the tech industry’s voracious need for power is now butting up against the nation’s schools and the youngsters who attend them. Jacobson draws on forth-coming research from Brown University that found that—wait for it—attending school near a giant buzzing data center causes math scores to drop. (No word yet on whether tutoring from Sally the humanoid robot can boost said scores…)
I’ve spent much of this past summer interviewing people across the country about how opposition to data centers and tech overreach in its various guises is also a public education fight. The conversations have been illuminating and inspiring, shedding light on why the revolt against data centers is proving to be so politically potent, and how it is merging with the broader, parent-led backlash against ed tech. (Sorry Sally!)
Unlikely allies
Much has been made of the uniquely bipartisan nature of opposition to data centers. My favorite recent description comes via this terrific report from Wisconsin and Michigan by tech writer Jasmine Sun, who cites an organizer marveling at the wondrous solidarity of it all:
I’m watching MAGA people coming together with Democratic Socialists and Native American female leaders, healers, and water protectors, and they’re all using words that none of them really recognize, and no one’s getting offended.
And in parts of the country where the school culture wars have raged with particular ferocity, the fight against data centers is bringing together Moms for Liberty types with public school advocates. It turns out that nothing focuses the mind like a plan to locate a massive Microsoft data center right next to the school athletic fields. (Looking at you northwest Indiana!) As a local activist told me, one of the loudest voices against the project formerly led the charge to remove books from school libraries. Dousing the flames of the school culture wars may turn out to be yet another unintended side effect of the rush to hyper-scale AI infrastructure.