Artificial Intelligence (AI) already has a strong presence in the social and education sectors, with 48% of funders and 66% of nonprofit respondents to a survey claiming their organizations use some type of AI. More than three-quarters of respondents believe their organizations will benefits from it.
Leaders worry, though, about built in bias in AI systems, cost, challenges in envisioning how AI can be used and a lack of technical expertise inside the organization.
That is some of the data and conclusions in the 23-page report “Inspiring Action: Identifying The Social Sector AI Opportunity Gap.” The national survey is a collaboration between Stanford University’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence and Project Evident in Boston. The idea was to shed light on the current use of, interest in, and opportunity for AI in the social and education sectors.
The exigent conversation for these sectors is not whether to use AI but how best to deploy it to enhance equitable outcomes. Researcher expected some of the responses regarding challenges but also found expectations for the future.
It’s precision analytics. AI goes from one size fits all to personalized interventions, said Sarah Di Troia, senior advisor, product innovation at Project Evident and one of the report’s five authors. “It’s a huge opportunity for customized intervention and incredible outsized impact,” she said.
Many of the AI tools have been around for decades with commercial entities using them for better customer targeting and satisfaction. While fundraisers have been using AI to identify and analyze donors, it was mostly using tools from their commercial vendors. “In some ways ChatGPT did a great service” when it comes to AI and the nonprofit sector, she said. AI natives have been using the tool, but ChatGPT has people more broadly thinking about AI, “talking about it, making it a real conversation,” said Di Troia.
“The velocity and depth of data,” AI allows “users to synthesize and recognize patterns the human eye can’t do,” she said. There is an opportunity gap, she explained. It is the difference between the current usage of AI and the belief that an organization would benefit from using more of it. The survey data showed 78% (42/54) of funders and 77% (138/179) of respondents at nonprofits believe their organizations would benefit from using more AI, creating an opportunity gap between current and desired usage.
Other data points include:
* Education nonprofits use AI significantly more than other nonprofits.
* While most respondents state they use AI in their work, many do not have an organizational policy guiding use.
* Approximately 80% of respondents who use AI deploy it for supportive work (finance, human resources, technology, communications, etc.), and only about 60% for mission-related work such as working with clients, implementing programs, or making grants.
* Bias in AI systems is the most cited barrier to AI adoption, followed by challenges in envisioning how AI can be used and a lack of expertise inside the organization. Nonprofits have a particular concern about the cost of AI technology.
Multiple recommendations were made based on the data. Among the actions are investing in the development of unified, cost-effective, and scalable upskilling resources; deep collaboration and experimentation between nonprofits, AI researchers, and AI developers; finding and investing in the creation and dissemination of case studies and stories of early adopters to study progress and share insights and findings.
The survey was launched online this past fall. Researchers exclusively considered respondents employed by nonprofits or grantmakers, constituting 59.1% of those who began the survey. From this group, researcher narrowed the selection to salaried workers, based on the assumption that full-time staff would have a more informed perspective on current use of, interest in, and opportunity for AI. Salaried workers accounted for 63.2% of those working for nonprofits or grantmakers. Excluded were excluding those in medical research, diseases, disorders & medical disciplines, public & societal benefit, and “other” services.
Click here to receive a full copy of the report https://projectevident.org/news/inspiring-action-ai-report/
