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LA2050 Blog

Throughout the past 18 months, the Goldhirsh Foundation and its LA2050 initiative have provided complimentary AI consulting, training, and workshops to the Los Angeles impact community. The work is led on the Foundation’s behalf by Jen García, Goldhirsh Foundation’s 

Below – and in upcoming monthly posts – García shares practical insights, real-world use cases, and emerging research to support nonprofits’ responsible and ethical adoption of AI tools.

First and foremost, in order for nonprofit leaders and staff to begin responsible, ethical AI adoption, they must remember that despite urging to jump in from individual AI champions and some media narratives, it is key to thoughtfully consider three key elements before diving in:

 Yes, generative AI has been on the scene commercially for two and a half years, but that doesn’t mean nonprofit organizations should jump in head-first. We encourage leaders to take a deliberate, steady approach to adoption, especially due to the potential risks.

Ensure that leadership undergoes training first.

 It is vital that leadership have an overview of generative AI tools and learn basic prompting before they make decisions on when and how it can be used for work. This training will also inform writing a working AI policy. We will cover these issues more in-depth in upcoming blogs.

 Once leadership is trained on generative AI basics, they will be able to identify use cases that align with the nonprofit’s mission and values. For example, although generative AI tools are often competent at producing marketing copy, that is not a good use case for nonprofits, who have deep community connections and unique trusted voices to uphold.

 are a useful way to not only group common threads but also upload files for continual context and provide custom instructions each prompt will adhere to within the project. This feature is available in paid subscriptions within ChatGPT Plus, Teams or Enterprise. (In fact, 

nonprofits receive 20% off of ChatGPT Teams

The Goldhirsh Foundation provided support to the Los Angeles Fire Department Foundation

, who in turn introduced us to LAFD Captain Matthew Sanchez. He told us he found it useful to leverage Google’s 

 to research – or just search – through publicly available information. (NotebookLM is a free generative AI tool that, unlike other tools, focuses solely on the context you provide.) Rather than searching through PDFs individually, Captain Sanchez can upload them into NotebookLM and query through them all at once. Nonprofit leaders may find this useful for grant or donor research, among many research-based use cases.

Photo: Participants at Hands-On AI Training for Nonprofits, a workshop held in March 2025 by the Goldhirsh Foundation and LA2050.

AI For Impact Monthly: July 2025

With this school year's commencement season at an end, all of us at the Goldhirsh Foundation and LA2050 congratulate the graduates of the Class of 2025 and their families!

We’re marking the occasion by releasing a new installment of what’s become an LA2050 blog tradition: A run-down of some of our favorite recent commencement speeches from colleges and universities in Los Angeles. 

This year, we’ve selected filmmaker Jon M. Chu, musician Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, educator and author Dr. Bettina Love, and CSUN communication studies graduate Désirée Kiva Powell. Read more and find links to their respective remarks, below.

Jon M. Chu | University of Southern California

On May 15th, USC School of Cinematic Arts alum Jon M. Chu took to the stage and addressed the 2025 USC graduating class as their main commencement speaker. Chu touched on the necessity of community in an ever-changing world. He focused on storytelling as the best navigator in an unprecedented time, and how the graduates’ job is “not simply to inherit a world, but to reimagine it and set the foundation for who we are moving forward.” He encouraged students to redirect their imagination away from worry and to embrace all the mistakes and flaws that led them to this point in their lives, emphasizing that the best stories are written alongside community. “You will go through tough times. Terrifying times even,” Chu said. “But your beautiful brain will figure out creative ways to get out of it. And your ferocity will get you through it.”

Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson | Loyola Marymount University

Academy Award-winning filmmaker and multiple GRAMMY Award-winning Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson of The Roots joined the Loyola Marymount University graduating class on May 17th as their main commencement speaker, sharing four guiding practices that he said provided him with the resilience to grow amidst adversity. Drawing from his personal experience, Thompson stressed the importance of gratitude, daily habits, conscious breathing, and movement as means of alleviating the anxieties of uncertainty and the physical toll of unprocessed emotions. He encouraged students to “dig deep” and noted that “the stuff that changes your life is usually buried under your biggest fears,” underscoring the power of self-affirmation. “Transformation begins with how you talk to yourself,” he said. “Flip that question, ‘Am I good enough?’ into, ‘I

On May 19th, 2025, author, academic, and educator Dr. Bettina Love addressed the doctoral graduates at the USC Rossier School of Education. Dr. Love also urged graduates not to confuse credentials with wisdom, and to always stay true to one’s community because “education without accountability is empty, and knowledge without application is wasted.” In her final remarks, Dr. Love encouraged graduates to center love and community in every endeavor. “A degree is what you bring into this world,” she said. “And that degree also asks you to give back, reflect, and keep learning.

On May 19th, CSUN Communication Studies graduate Désirée Kiva Powell addressed her class of 2025 peers at the university’s commencement for the Mike Curb College of Arts, Media, & Communication. Sharing some of her own life’s triumphs and tribulations, Powell reminded graduates that when you are down the only way to go is up: “Mistakes are always an opportunity to grow, and messing up is how you really learn.” As Powell reminisced on her educational journey and her experiences as a single mom of two, she highlighted the importance of learning to be happy and present.

To all the recent graduates who are stressing about their next steps or worrying about their future, embrace both the sweet and sour moments of your journey. In the wise words of Désirée Kiva Powell, always remember that “life should be lived… if you dare!”

 Four of Our Favorite LA Commencement Speeches: 2025 Edition 

. The foundation served as the Los Angeles regional convener for OpenAI’s day-long AI Nonprofit Jam. 

OpenAI described the event as, “a one-day, nationwide event that brought together more than 1,000 nonprofit leaders across 10 locations… teams worked with these leaders to explore how generative AI can help scale their impact – and listened to, learned from, and collaborated with those at the center of this vital work."

The AI Nonprofit Jams across the country were hosted by OpenAI in coordination with the 

Goldhirsh Foundation and LA2050 president, Tara Roth, delivered welcome remarks in Los Angeles, kicking off a day that included participation from many of our LA2050 grantees. Among them, Defy Ventures and 

 who received free-of-charge AI training from Goldhirsh Foundation’s AI 

, Jen García. AltaSea also spoke at the event. 

Other speakers included Dr. Robert K. Ross, former president and CEO of The California Endowment, Efrain Escobedo, president and CEO of CNM, and via video, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

AI, especially as related to ethics and community impact, is a topic the Goldhirsh Foundation and LA2050 have been tracking since 2019. For more information, including a 

Image 1: Open AI Nonprofit Jam participants. Image 2: Goldhirsh Foundation president Tara Roth with AI executive-in-residence Jen García. Image 3: Efrain Escobedo, president and CEO of Center of Nonprofit Management.

LA2050 Blog

Goldhirsh Foundation Partners With OpenAI on ‘AI Nonprofit Jam’