This policy establishes Teaching for Change’s guidelines regarding the use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools by staff, volunteers, contractors, and board members (henceforth known as TFC community members) acting on behalf of the organization. It is intended to protect the integrity of our work, the privacy of everyone we work with, and the trust our community places in us. The safety of our community, both on and off-line, are critically important. It supports that everyone engages with the best intentions, to learn and grow, and to support the movement for education justice.
This policy applies to all activities conducted using organizational devices, accounts, networks, or any personally-owned devices when used for organizational work.
Definitions
For the purposes of this policy, it is important to distinguish between categories of AI:
Generative AI: systems that mine vast amounts of data to produce text, images, audio, video, or other content in response to prompts. This includes, but is not limited to, models such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Copilot, Jasper, and similar tools. It also includes AI image generators such as Midjourney, DALL-E, and Adobe Firefly.
Administrative AI Features: functionality embedded within existing, established software platforms that automates routine tasks, flags patterns, or generates data-driven suggestions — without producing original content for external use.
Prohibited Uses — Generative AI
The use of generative AI tools is prohibited for the following purposes:
Drafting, editing, or generating any content intended to represent the organization
Creating, summarizing, or analyzing documents that contain personally identifiable information (PII), protected health information (PHI), financial records, or any confidential data.
Generating images, graphics, or multimedia content for use in organizational materials.
Social media enhancing tools
Canva AI generative tools: photo creation, etc. (All other tools are permitted for Canva.)
AI Notetakers: Example language to use in meetings/events.
For the comfort and privacy of all participants, we will not allow the use of AI notetakers throughout our event. Our primary reasons for this are:
The uncertainty around the processing and storage of data by AI providers.
The recording of participants’ names, faces, and conversations without consent.
The ethical considerations of using AI to record, transcribe, and summarize meeting discussions, and to ensure our sessions continue to be a safe place for those we meet with.
The environmental impact and carbon footprint of data processing centers, and the energy consumption to run and maintain them.
Permitted Uses — Automated AI Features in Administrative Tools
The following features, embedded within approved organizational software, are permitted for internal administrative use:
Accessibility features such as automated captioning for internal meetings and public events (e.g., Zoom’s live captions), where transcripts are not retained or shared externally.
Spam, phishing, and malware detection within email and security platforms.
Grammar, spelling, and basic style suggestions within word processing software, provided the substance and voice of all content remains authored by TFC community members.
Automated scheduling and calendar optimization tools (e.g., scheduling features in Google Workspace).
Data deduplication, address standardization, and contact-matching features within approved CRM platforms (e.g., Neon One, Givebutter, QuickBooks).
Automated data backup, file organization, and workflow routing features in approved project management tools.
Values
This policy reflects our organizational values in the following ways:
Transparency: Our community, funders, and partners engage with us because of the expertise, relationships, and lived experience our team brings. Generative AI cannot replicate that, and presenting AI-generated work as our own would misrepresent who we are.
Data Privacy: Generative AI platforms are frequently trained on, or may retain, data entered into them. Entering people’s information, case details, or confidential organizational data into these platforms creates serious and unacceptable privacy risks.
Equity and Labor: We are committed to ensuring that the adoption of new technologies does not devalue the skilled work of our staff or contribute to broader patterns of harm in the AI industry against vulnerable or marginalized communities.
Teaching for Change’s AI Policy
Purpose and Scope
This policy establishes Teaching for Change’s guidelines regarding the use of artificial intelligence (AI) tools by staff, volunteers, contractors, and board members (henceforth known as TFC community members) acting on behalf of the organization. It is intended to protect the integrity of our work, the privacy of everyone we work with, and the trust our community places in us. The safety of our community, both on and off-line, are critically important. It supports that everyone engages with the best intentions, to learn and grow, and to support the movement for education justice.
This policy applies to all activities conducted using organizational devices, accounts, networks, or any personally-owned devices when used for organizational work.
Definitions
For the purposes of this policy, it is important to distinguish between categories of AI:
Generative AI: systems that mine vast amounts of data to produce text, images, audio, video, or other content in response to prompts. This includes, but is not limited to, models such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Copilot, Jasper, and similar tools. It also includes AI image generators such as Midjourney, DALL-E, and Adobe Firefly.
Administrative AI Features: functionality embedded within existing, established software platforms that automates routine tasks, flags patterns, or generates data-driven suggestions — without producing original content for external use.
Prohibited Uses — Generative AI
The use of generative AI tools is prohibited for the following purposes:
For the comfort and privacy of all participants, we will not allow the use of AI notetakers throughout our event. Our primary reasons for this are:
Permitted Uses — Automated AI Features in Administrative Tools
The following features, embedded within approved organizational software, are permitted for internal administrative use:
Values
This policy reflects our organizational values in the following ways:
Transparency: Our community, funders, and partners engage with us because of the expertise, relationships, and lived experience our team brings. Generative AI cannot replicate that, and presenting AI-generated work as our own would misrepresent who we are.
Data Privacy: Generative AI platforms are frequently trained on, or may retain, data entered into them. Entering people’s information, case details, or confidential organizational data into these platforms creates serious and unacceptable privacy risks.
Equity and Labor: We are committed to ensuring that the adoption of new technologies does not devalue the skilled work of our staff or contribute to broader patterns of harm in the AI industry against vulnerable or marginalized communities.
Environmental Justice: Generative AI has a substantial environmental footprint, driven by massive energy consumption for training and inference, alongside intensive water usage for cooling data centers.
Resources
Getting started on a responsible AI use policy for nonprofits from Candid
Template: Acceptable Use of AI Tools in the Nonprofit Workplace from Community IT Innovators
Empire of AI: Dreams and Nightmares in Sam Altman’s OpenAI by Karen Hao
Also see: Privacy Notice
Last updated: July 28, 2026