For more than a century, Cooperative Extension has helped improve the quality of life for North Carolinians.

The work began in our fields and farms, helping families grow more food and steward the land. Over time, that mission expanded to include nutrition, youth development, financial education, health, gardening, workforce skills, and digital literacy. While the subjects have changed, the purpose has remained the same: helping people live healthier, wiser, and more connected lives.

Today, artificial intelligence may be the newest chapter in that mission. Every week brings another headline predicting either extraordinary breakthroughs or existential risks. It's easy to wonder where ordinary people fit into the conversation.

Every few months I come across an idea that shifts the way I think. This month it was a remarkable 14-minute presentation by AI researcher Chloe Lubinski at the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (ARC) Conference. Rather than focusing on the latest AI tool, she offers something more valuable: a clear explanation of where AI stands today and an encouraging vision of where it could lead.

Ove the past two years, I have taught AI to older adults, teens, job seekers, and community groups across Guilford County. One question repeatedly comes up, “Is AI going to replace us?”. Lubinski doesn’t dismiss that concern. Instead, she reframes it. Rather than asking what AI will replace, she asks AI might restore.

One idea stood out above all the others.

Near the end of her presentation, Lubinski suggests that the greatest promise of AI may not be producing more content or increasing productivity. Instead, if we develop and use it wisely, AI could give us more time for the activities that have always made us human: caring for an aging parent, raising a market garden, helping a neightbor to repair their deck, or sitting down for a meal with friends.

Gardens are places of heart softening.

When I first began with Extension, I partnered with a horticulturalist to teach market gardening in her innovative program: the Forsyth County Urban Farm School. It serves adults who want to learn how to start and operate a small-scale market garden, whether for supplemental income or as a new business.

Perhaps that idea of Lubinski gave me the most hope. The future she describes isn’t one where technology replaces gardening—it is one where technology gives us more opportunities to garden.

The Questions That Matter

As North Carolina continues to adopt AI in schools, businesses, healthcare, agriculture, and local government, perhaps the most important questions are not technical ones.

Instead, we might ask:

• If AI saved you five hours every week, what could you do to serve a neighbor?
• What work in your life feels deeply human—work that no machine could replace?
• What skills could you share with a child that AI couldn’t easily imitate?
• What knowledge, stories, and values are we passing on to the next generation—and to the AI systems increasingly learning from humanity's words?

These are not questions for engineers alone.

They belong to parents, teachers, farmers, business owners, healthcare workers, community leaders, retirees, students, and anyone who cares about the future of our communities.

A Different Way to Think About AI

Much of the public conversation centers on what AI can do.

• Write documents.
• Answer questions.
• Generate images.
• Analyze data.

Those are useful capabilities, but they are not the most important conversation.

Perhaps a better question is: What will AI allow us to become?

If AI simply helps us work longer hours or consume more information, we may have missed its greatest opportunity.

But if it allows us to spend more time mentoring young people, volunteering, growing food, learning new skills, creating art, visiting neighbors, exploring nature, and strengthening our communities, then it may help us rediscover activities that have always been central to a meaningful life.

An Invitation

Whether you are excited about artificial intelligence or uncertain about what it means, I encourage you to spend fourteen minutes watching Chloe Lubinski's presentation.

Not because it predicts the future.

But because it asks us to think carefully about the future we want to build.

Technology has always changed how we live.

Hardware will improve. Software will become more capable. Those advances do not determine our future. We do. We can become more thoughtful, more intentional and indulge in greater listening. Curious learners. Faithful stewards. Better neighbors. Stronger families.

The enduring question is whether we will use AI to become busier—or to become more fully human. Digital literacy isn’t about keeping up with technology. It’s about making thoughtful choices. Understanding AI gives us the opportunity to shift from being reactive to becoming more proactive. Extension started with a practical question: How knowledge could improve everyday life? Lubinski is asking a similar question: How AI can improve everyday life without replacing what matters most?