Guide
How to find smart, low-cost AI models
A short method for choosing API models by capability, total task cost, provider terms, and performance on your organization’s real work.
Browse Everything
Every guide, how-to, case study, prompt, tool overview, talk, and FAQ in one place. Filter it down, then share the link.
Type
Topic
Role
37 resources
Guide
Picking the right AI model and effort level for the task
AI tools give you two separate dials: which model answers, and how hard it works before answering. A professor/student analogy shows which one actually helps for the task in front of you.
Guide
Should you worry about law enforcement accessing your AI conversations?
Major AI vendors and meeting recorders will hand over conversation content when compelled by valid legal process, and both OpenAI and Anthropic report doing exactly that — but most reported cases so far involve a phone or laptop seized from a suspect, not chat data pulled from the vendor.
Guide
Use AI to work with video
Use ChatGPT Codex or Claude Cowork to understand footage, find strong moments, and create a social edit. This guide shares what we tested, where Premiere may fit, and what still needs human review.
Prompt
Campaign Pre-Mortem
Before you commit to a campaign or project plan, ask AI to imagine it has already failed — and tell you why.
Tool overview
ChatGPT
OpenAI's general AI assistant for drafting, summarizing, analyzing files, and multi-step research. The most widely recognized tool of its kind, and often the one your staff have already tried.
Tool overview
Faunalytics Lens
A free AI research assistant that answers questions using Faunalytics' library of 6,000+ human-vetted animal advocacy research summaries, with citations to the underlying sources.
Tool overview
Gemini
Google's general AI assistant, built into Gmail, Docs, and Drive. Eligible nonprofits get the premium features at no cost through Google Workspace for Nonprofits, which makes it the cheapest serious starting point for most teams.
Guide
How to pick the right AI tools for your team
How to divide an AI budget across a team: a paid assistant seat for everyone plus a meeting recorder, specialist tools for specialist roles, the AI features already inside your existing software, and heavier plans for the few people who will use them.
How-to
Turn meeting notes into action items
AI note-takers can turn a meeting into a summary, decisions, and action items. Use them to capture the call, then check the details before sharing the notes as the record.
Case study
Building a public resource library link monitor with AI assistance
Vegan Hacktivists worked with a small team to design and build a Google Apps Script monitor for its public resource hub. AI helped assess the problem and write the code; the finished script checks links with deterministic rules and leaves decisions to staff.
FAQ
How do we choose between n8n, Make, Apps Script, and custom code?
Use n8n for flexible AI-heavy multi-step workflows, Make for fast visual connections across familiar SaaS tools, Apps Script for lightweight Google Workspace tasks, and custom code when logic outgrows no-code.
FAQ
What's the difference between Claude, Claude Code, and Claude Cowork?
All three run the same Claude models. What changes is how much of your computer each one can reach. Cowork is where we suggest most people start.
FAQ
What is deep research?
Deep research searches many sources and produces a detailed, cited report. Use it for complex questions, then verify the sources and claims.
Prompt
Accurate Study Summary
You need to understand a research paper quickly and report on it without overstating what it found.
Prompt
Action Alert: Email and Social Versions
A bill is moving and you need to mobilize supporters to contact their legislators this week.
Prompt
Board Report Drafter
A board meeting is approaching and you need to turn scattered program updates and metrics into a coherent report.
Prompt
Donor Stewardship Update
You want to send donors a no-ask update that keeps them connected between appeals.
Prompt
Grant Proposal First Draft
You have a grant deadline, a mountain of messy program notes, and no draft.
Prompt
Meeting Minutes From Raw Notes
You have messy notes or a transcript from a meeting and need clean minutes with decisions, action items, and owners.
Prompt
Press Release Draft
You need a clean, newsroom-ready press release for an announcement, campaign launch, report release, or rescue/event, and you're starting from scattered notes.
Tool overview
Claude
A general AI assistant from Anthropic for drafting, summarizing, analyzing files, and thinking through problems. For most staff, this is the right first tool to learn.
Guide
Create your organization's AI policy
A section-by-section worksheet for writing an AI policy your staff will use, with starter questions for each section and a skeleton outline you can copy.
Guide
The six pillars of AI transformation
A working framework for organizational AI adoption: six areas — narrative, tools, training, guardrails, workflows, and rhythm — that need attention together for experiments to build lasting capability.
Training
Building Your Organization's AI Strategy — AVA Summit 2026
Our AVA Summit talk on fluidity and agency in a changing world: six lanes every organization's AI strategy needs to cover — with the full slide deck to use with your team.
Tool overview
Gamma
An AI tool that turns prompts, outlines, and existing documents into first-draft presentations, documents, and lightweight websites.
Guide
Set up Claude for your organization
A practical walkthrough of setting up a Claude Team account for a nonprofit: verification and discounts, admin choices, connectors and shared skills, privacy settings, and recommended defaults for advocacy orgs.
FAQ
What do other organizations' AI policies look like?
Four organizations serving the animal advocacy movement publish full AI policies covering values, tools, and day-to-day rules. One is notably more permissive than the rest. Compare their choices, then adapt the parts that fit your organization.
FAQ
What is an AI agent?
An AI agent pursues a goal across multiple steps, using tools to read files, search, update systems, and check its work.
FAQ
What does AI actually cost for a small organization?
Nonprofit plans can reduce the bill sharply. Standard paid seats usually cost tens of dollars per person each month; automation platforms can be inexpensive at small scale; APIs charge separately by usage.
Case study
Applicant intake research with a human decision
A capacity-building services program uses an n8n workflow to research each new applicant, compile a source-linked brief, and post a summary to Slack — so the team starts every review with consistent context.
Case study
A support inbox assistant that drafts replies from a regularly updated FAQ
A program team answering a high-volume support inbox designed a service that matches incoming questions to its FAQ and drafts replies in its voice — as Gmail drafts for staff to review. Currently at the concept stage.
FAQ
Is our data used to train AI models?
It depends on the vendor, plan, and settings — business and API tiers usually do not train on your data by default, consumer plans vary, and policies change, so check and document your settings.
Case study
A first-pass research assistant for conference speaker review
A team that runs a recurring conference piloted an n8n workflow that researches speaker applications with AI and web search, then assembles a source-linked workbook and per-submission summaries for organizers to review.
Guide
Common staff concerns about AI
The objections staff often raise about AI, taken seriously rather than dismissed — with what is true in each, the data behind it, and language options for the conversations leaders are already having.
Case study
Event email draft builder: from spreadsheet row to Gmail draft
A communications team running recurring events uses Make.com and an AI drafting step to turn event details into ready-to-review Gmail drafts, complete with calendar links. Nothing ever sends automatically.
Guide
Data security and privacy basics for AI tools
A simple four-tier model for deciding what data can go into AI tools, what to check before you trust a vendor, and practical defaults a small organization can adopt this week.
Want help putting this to work?
Vegan Hacktivists offers free AI and automation support to animal protection organizations — from a first conversation to a full build.
