The US-based James Irvine Foundation has a singular goal: a California where all low-income workers have the power to advance economically. In the early days of the foundation’s AI exploration, it used some of its grantmaking resources to provide additional capacity to organizations ready to experiment with AI and to explore new applications. NDWA, one of the foundation’s core grantees, received funding to develop Ask Aya.
“That allowed us to learn alongside them,” says Lul Tesfai, director of program development at the foundation. “It gave us an opportunity to support something beyond the scope of our normal grantmaking while helping us understand what was possible.”
"We’re bringing together grantees, researchers, technologists, and policymakers to imagine futures that aren’t here yet but could emerge,” says Tesfai. “We’re asking: what kinds of solutions would we need in those futures?"
For the foundation, funding AI-related work helps advance its core focus. It believes philanthropy can help grantees understand, shape, and govern the use of this technology in ways that advance their missions.
Learn More About Choosing Your AI Path
Tesfai notes that direct service organizations are under tremendous pressure. “They’re stretched thin, responding to crisis after crisis,” she says. “They’ve told us directly that they don’t have enough staff, enough time, or enough capacity to devote significant energy to figuring out AI.” The foundation maintains inventories of AI toolkits, funding opportunities, learning resources, and guides so these organizations can get up to speed quickly.
The foundation’s own AI journey, including early use of Microsoft Copilot and a broader roll-out of Anthropic’s Claude, helped staff better understand the practical questions grantees face around tool selection, staff capacity, risks, and community impact. That internal process, says Tesfai, has improved the foundation’s programmatic work.
While the foundation actively engages in the internal work of Dimension 1 (Augment) and the mission work of Dimension 2 (Advance), it is also investing its resources in Dimension 3 (Advocate). The foundation participates in several AI-focused funder collaboratives and learning spaces, including Opportunity AI, a philanthropic collaborative focusing on expanding economic opportunity with AI at the core of its work, and partners with other funders to deepen knowledge.
Most recently, the foundation partnered with Windfall Trust to organize an AI scenario-planning workshop. “We’re bringing together grantees, researchers, technologists, and policymakers to imagine futures that aren’t here yet but could emerge,” says Tesfai. “We’re asking: What kinds of solutions would we need in those futures?”
