MSC archived stories - April 13, 2024
With system changes happening at CI, you may want to read this...
It says, by 2025, CI hopes to have no data centers or VMs and be 100% cloud-hosted and cloud-native.
Ex military man, Mr Bachta's driving CI into "No VMs" world is very concerning. Virtual Machines are cloud based, so allow staff to work from anywhere. Getting rid of VMs means AI (Artificial intelligence) will dominate future of CI operation. What that means for child-sponsor relationship?
Well, 3 weeks ago I asked my Juliana… "You used to handwrite letters and draw pictures for me but how do you find the new way of communication?"
She replied… "While I enjoy digital communication, I do miss the personal touch of handwritten letters."
Our digital letters will be scanned and edited by AI before passing onto child or us. AI is developing constantly, which could even make editing more age appropriate!
Business of "Child Sponsorship" has a human child at one end and a real sponsor at the other. In between us will be 'cloud-native' connecting bridge controlled by AI and a handful of staff.
My question to Mr Bachta is how will you address Juliana's concern over missing of 'personal touch' in CI program?
The only thing that concerns me is the "Our digital letters will be [...] edited by AI" part depending on how "creative" the editing gets. An AI checking the letters for certain forbidden words and then passing them to a human to check is one thing, but I don't want an AI to make creative decisions and fix/reword/edit the text of my letters.
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
The signs are there what's to come... unfortunately, AI will take over almost entire decision making process. I believe CI perhaps the first to implement AI in Non-profit sector. Mr Bachta is a risk-taker and believes in fostering a culture of experimentation (can you believe)!
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
Risk-taking is not inherently bad, but AI is only as good as its programmers. How many times does auto-correct / auto-complete replace things with the wrong word? Quite frequently, in my experience. That's because a lot of the rules used by an AI to respond a certain way (because the majority of situations where it comes up are the same and predictable) do have exceptions and it's impossible to cover them all in the programming. That's why I don't like the idea of an AI being allowed to meddle with my letters. As I said, I have nothing against an AI being the first one to check for inappropriate content/words or to fix minor and obvious typos, as long as it doesn't have too much authority / creative freedom to make changes and there is a real human overseeing the process to detect / fix instances of the AI being wrong.
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
Speaking of which, I am ready to bet that the long, perfectly composed, error-free letter written in educated native-level English I received from a young child with only some knowledge of English relied heavily on AI. To give an example of just one sentence: “It’s a reminder of the diverse challenges and perspectives people face around the world.” The child’s previous letters felt genuine, with their non-native English and simpler structure and vocabulary. This is definitely a different voice. I am curious to know whether it was CI or the child that used AI - after all, nowadays the children can send letters from their own electronic devices, without visiting a CI center. Sadly, this lessens my interest in communicating with the child, which surely can’t be CI’s intention?
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
I wonder charity regulators are behind this agenda to encourage non-profits to take AI path. The danger is that AI is becoming capable of concealing real child's emotions expressed in a letter. For example, how can I be sure whether 12yo Juliana's answer (above) is genuine or interpreted by AI.
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
The new changes already implemented by CI and the new ones mentioned will further weaken the relationships between sponsor and child/youth.
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
@chelaka: "The danger is that AI is becoming capable of concealing real child's emotions expressed in a letter." That's a good point. A lot of meaning is conveyed with the choice of words and the way a person's thoughts and emotions are articulated. If an AI alters the text, even if the explicit meaning of the words put together is the same, the emotions or personality that's conveyed "between the lines" is completely lost and that does diminish the ability of a sponsor and a child to connect. That's why I said I'm against giving too much creative freedom to the AI, because while the meaning of the sentences written by the child (or the sponsor) may not be lost with the changes, the personality or emotion they convey can be, if the text is edited, words are replaced, etc. (Nor do I want an AI to make the child seem more enthusiastic/appreciative/loving/etc. towards the sponsors in their letters as a result of AI tampering. I want whatever is written to come across as honestly and sincerely as possible, even if it lacks emotion or personality. The bottom line is that I don't want anything to be lost *or added*.
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
I am not a fan of this at all. It is bad enough we lost the physically written letters, but now we have the potential risk from both sides of AI deciding what we mean when we write? I agree with what everyone has said so far, that now, even if the meaning of what we read is from the child, we may start to question it. I also saw that they are doing this to see what sponsors want. I find this interesting as we have been letting them know for years what we want and it has been falling on deaf ears. I guess AI will figure that out better than us telling them. Now they turn around and do this and I can't say that it was anything I wanted...I will have to see how this is implemented. I have already been developing concerns about CI from the handwritten letter option being taken from us (though I adjusted) to the way they handled the India situation and even now I have an EG that I had sent to Zainab in July of last year and ended up transferring to Mary in January that I STILL HAVE NOT HEARD ABOUT and it has been 10 weeks since Mary's birthday and longer than that since the EG was transferred.
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
How many of us have received a letter from a sponsored child and something felt off, out of kilter? How many have struggled daily with auto-correct haphazardly changing words and meanings of sentences? I am not a big fan of ai and I hate to think that I will be questioning every correspondence I receive from my "kids".
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
Before Covid I would send my kids hand written letters and felt like it was my special touch to my kids and boy do I miss it. I wondering what other things will change with CI
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
AI is becoming such a danger. It is extremely pervasive. I absolutely do not want artificial intelligence medaling in my correspondence with my sponsored kids. AI is a bad influence. I don’t want to be communicating with an AI when I think l am communicating with my sponsored kids or the other way around. I do not want my kids to hear things from an AI when they think they are hearing from me. AI is just too powerful.
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
I have been a 20+ year sponsor of youth with CI. Prior to that time, I was sponsoring youth through a different charitable organization. I chose CI because when I first became a sponsor there was the one to one relationship with the youth that I wanted. The previous organization started out with a one to one type structure but transitioned to a more "generic" organization in which, what ever funds you sent, went to a general fund for the organization to use as needed. That is why I left and became a CI sponsor. As with many others writing on this subject, I used to send a lot of personal letters and pictures. To me that was one of the main elements of the one to one relationship. Now if I want to send "real" pictures I send them to the Field Office of the country where the youth is located. Over the past several years, it appears to me, CI has been slowly moving away from the meaningful aspect, at least for me, of the one to one relationship. In reading the referenced article there was one particular phrase that jumped out at me, "...making the transition to the cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) to reduce costs and gain more insight into their donors and those they serve...". It was not the saving costs that caught my attention (I am all for that). It is the second part about AI gaining more insight into their donors. AI is not capable of eliciting from my words the emotion and feelings I have for the youth I sponsor and I would contend it is not capable of doing the same for the youth. Things at times now seem to be less personable and just more mechanical in nature. I too have wondered about some of the letters I have received at times because there seemed to be a quantum leap in the words used and how the youth expressed themselves. It would be great if they actually progressed that far in their writing and how they express themselves. It would bode well for them in the future. I have begun to wonder about a number of things.
ReplyDeleteApril 13, 2024
Here is my take on efficiency and saving costs, because it's been coming up a lot in the past couple of years: While efficiency is a good thing, I remember reading that child sponsorship is not the most cost-efficient way of helping children who live in poverty. In addition to that, even within the child sponsorship model, allowing sponsors to send Extra Gifts, letters, or to do inquiries about the children's educational (or in some cases medical) needs is not the most efficient way for an organization to get the most value out of sponsorship dollars. If the main goal is to be as efficient as possible, a lot of the things that allow us to build relationships with our sponsored children would have to go (and it seems like they are starting to go, for example, it looks like the handwritten letters won't be coming back any time soon). But I feel like it's not fair to put a dollar value on everything. Would I have become a sponsor if I was not able to write and receive letters, get photos of my sponsored children or send them Extra Gifts? No. Which means all the sponsorship money that comes from me is coming because CI is not 100% efficient, because there are things that we as sponsors can do or get that are possible despite them not being the most efficient way to do things. Because let's face it, the most efficient way to help children living in poverty is to drop the letters, drop the photos, because those all cost money and just pool 100% of the donations to help the children without spending any of it on "perks". That's how some non-profits do it and they are more efficient than the child sponsorship model in using the money. But are they more efficient at getting donations? There is value in the bond between sponsor and child because it motivates us to give more and to be more involved. There is value in the letters the children receive, because they show them that someone a world away cares about them and wants them to succeed...
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
[This is a continuation of my comment above because I ran out of space.] I think it's hard to compare the emotional effect on a sponsor of seeing the faces of their sponsored children on Extra Gift photos and reading how grateful the entire family was for their donation and how much it helped them, of receiving letters from the children and watching them grow up to what we get from from other types of non-profits where we give a donation and we know it was for a good cause, but other than abstract reports on where the money went, there isn't much of an emotional impact besides the satisfaction of knowing that we've helped someone somewhere. So efficiency isn't everything and I hope the decision-makers at CI keep that in mind. It's good to have a variety of organizations with different ways to give for different causes because that way there is something for everyone. Child sponsorship may not be the most efficient, but it's the most appealing to me because of the personal connection involved. If this push for efficiency continues, dropping certain elements of the child-sponsor communication because they cost money that could go to helping the children instead, while some sponsors may celebrate that, I think there has to be a balance between cutting costs / eliminating sponsorship perks to save money and having some ways for sponsors and the children they help to connect on a personal level and build a relationship, which may cost money and may create extra work for staff that doesn't directly improve the lives of the children (at least not in a way an accountant can measure), but it also adds something that can keep both the sponsors and the children in the program more engaged and more involved. Just my opinion...
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
Wow, for sure the leadership team will have plenty to re-consider decisions made at their recent board meetings. To this year CI has been operational for 88yrs and half of that time the child-sponsorship program is running as the main revenue stream for the organisation. Around 12% of CI expenses annually goes toward raising funds. AI promises to significantly cut this cost and make more revenue by gaining donor/sponsor insight. This could mean gathering personal data from each supporter. President Biden talked about the impact of AI in society just last September [youtube.com/live/tg2FNynmToM] and the European Parliament has approved the 'EU AI Act' only last month. Even with safeguards in place, how can I or the child trust an AI translated letter. When we write a letter in English or Spanish, AI should only be able to simply accept or reject and send it back for revision rather than fiddle around. Even when an adult transcribing child's response or taking it down verbatim first in Spanish, then translating into (perfect) English could lose the original child version.
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
I add my voice to the upset. I have fretted recently about AI -- The letters I am currently receiving are stilted with unusual English and particularly unnatural expressions, much more than usual for translations. I asked out loud: Is it AI interference? Because I sponsor over 20 children/youths --covering eight CI countries -- and I'm a professional writer, yes, I might be particularly sensitive to sentence rhythms and word choices. Here is an example: How is it that a ten-year-old in Columbia writes a sentence like "I am so happy to ring in the New Year with my family again." I squinted at the sentence -- Sure, I can wonder if the child was coached, but my concern centered primarily on the likelihood of AI intrusiveness. I vote no on AI interfering with communications from our sponsored children/youths, but I've voted no on AI many times before in other situations to no avail... I'm accustomed to losing this fight.
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
I wholeheartedly agree with Gabor...I realize the goal is to be efficient and allow the children to have access to CI's community centers and programs to educate, empower and employ...but I also fear that this push for efficiency will come at a cost. And that cost is our personal relationship with the children we sponsor.And it is the emotional connections through letters, extra gifts, and visits that keeps me engaged and coming back. I am not totally against AI if it is used as chelaka states and translates the letters only, and does not change the sentiment and emotion of a child's letter. I love the children's letters! If their main source of fundraising is through child sponsorship, they should continue to strengthen the connection opportunities and attempt to speed them up instead of trying to limit them. Unfortunately, in this highly technical age, people struggle to wait for their letters and EG responses and I think this may often be the most cited reason for losing sponsorship. I certainly hope they don't sacrifice our personal connections with the children for efficiency as our letters do serve as beacons of hope, encouragement, and love and make our children feel special and loved and seen. How can you put a price on that?
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
This is the letter I received with the picture of Delmy's e.g."Dear sponsor Mrs. Saigeon, I wish you well with your family. Saigeon, I wish you are well with your family and having success in each of your daily work, I want to thank you for the support given, thanks to that I could buy things I needed for my home, both for me and for my family, I tell you that I bought a palette of shadows, which I can use to decorate my materials that I use where I study and I could also buy an iron, which I can use to decorate my materials that I use where I study and I could also buy an iron, as it is very useful for me, I wish that God will always bless you and take care of you, may he shower many blessings on you and your family, I hope to hear from you soon, I say goodbye with a big hug."It makes me wonder...it is oddly different from previous letters. She had started opening with Dear sponsor, so that is fine, but she has Saigeon in there awkwardly. She then repeats herself wishing me well and then again later when talking about the iron. She is from Guatemala, so I know it was translated, but none of her previous letters were this jumbled...makes me wonder...
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
I feel like one of the biggest barriers that I’ve encountered to people sponsoring is their lack of trust that the “children are real”— even intelligent, well informed people can believe the conspiracy theories surrounding this form of funding. Now we’ve got some AI happening and how is _that_ going to affect trust?? If CI is wishing to continue with individual sponsorship then they should not be using technology that people inherently do not trust already, and they certainly should not be applying it to the only personal connection we have with the children. Maybe its just one of those things: they’ve decided to sacrifice the sponsors who want a personal relationship (you know, like they promise in their advertising “You’ll be part of the family…”) in favor of people who don’t write, just donate their money. It truly feels like CI really doesn’t give a damn. I don’t know where all of this is going, but after 20 years of sponsorship I don’t like the direction and am loosing faith.
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
Wait… so if the letters coming to us are compromised, does that mean the children are getting equally compromised letters from us??? Is that even legal to apply CI to letters and not inform people? I mean, sure, it’s not ethical, but is it legal? This is why we need legislation regulating this stuff. I know Biden is working on that, but did not feel it applied to my life until now.
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
It IS possible that the child might independently test AI as a letter-editing tool, without CI being involved. Most of our sponsored children have phones and other electronic devices. They use these devices to write letters to their sponsors. Everyone is talking about ChatGPT, so they’d likely have heard about it and may even use it to do their homework and, why not, write letters.
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
Artificial Intelligence(AI) is taking over the world with mixed opinions about various things. I am not a big fan of AI either, but I don't think that it is up to us. We should give the AI a try and see what we think before we jump to conclusions. Although hand written letters are the best, the pandemic has changed a lot of things including mail, photos, and drawings. There probably is a way for us to draw pictures and/or send photos through Artificial Intelligence(AI). This will only work if CI tells us what AI program(s) they are using and/or we can wait to see what the new system is like before they change it over completely. I hope that this will not be too much of a problem for us. The iCloud issue was resolved today, but thank you for helping me out.
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
@got2luvthisworld: I think you may be confusing cloud storage with artificial intelligence (AI). Artificial intelligence is when a computer algorithm makes decisions or solves problems on its own, thereby simulating human intelligence - it's not a way to store or transfer files like photos. (Also, iCloud is owned by Apple, not by Microsoft. OneDrive is the one owned by Microsoft.)
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
As someone who has literally just started sponsoring a child this has really concerned me. I chose children international as it looked like the best to be able to form a great close relationship with a child. Now I’m wondering if I’ve made the right choice
ReplyDeleteApril 14, 2024
@got2luvthisworld My husband is a Cloud Architect for a big corporation. It’s not the cloud based storage, which all the corporations are switching to, slowly but surely, that is the problem. That doesn't affect sponsors much, unless there’s an issue with the migration of data, a data breach, or a catastrophic loss of data that cannot be recovered. All of these things are rare, and can happen with more traditional forms of data storage anyways. It’s the AI thats the problem. As someone else pointed out in this thread, AI is only as good as its programming. Which means that things like a programmers bias can infiltrate and affect us end users later… so if the person doing the programming thinks that formal, thankful letters are the way to go… we get formal, thankful letters kind of superimposed over the child’s writing… its difficult to describe how this works, and I’m not privy to CI’s AI programming, but there is no way this will not affect communication in some ways. Certainly the use of AI will smooth out the little inconsistent things that we sponsors love, the quirks that add personality, in the name of good grammer or whatnot… what a loss. I love that stage the children go through with the broken English— adorable! This is a sticky wicket.
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
I'd rather wait for 3 months to see a genuine letter from my children than receiving an AI generated “rubbish” less than a month in turnaround time. If CI want to focus on children and partners alone, what am I doing here? I question Mr Bachta's business driven mindset – (listen to this podcast) -- www.hso.com/podcast/dynamics-matters-podcast-ep-105-how-to-bridge-the-technology-equality-divide#technology-adoption-and-transformation
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
@snow-tiger, I'm sorry, but we are still waiting for the reply to the donation we were unable to deliver to Zainab that you allow us to transfer to Mary for her birthday. As soon as we receive the follow-up information, we'll send it to you. I do appreciate your patience!
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
HelloThere are several things about Children international that I don't like lately. I miss the hand written letters and I know why we can't have them back. The other thing is when I asked about Hayden's brother and why he isn't listed anymore. I was told ask her in a letter. I did ask but now I'm waiting to find out what happened. I just hope that nothing bad happened. Today I asked if a hotel was close enough for staff to pick us up for the visit and I was told you have to find your own way to the center. I know of other people has visited and most of them got picked up. This makes feel like sponsors don't matter. Debating if I should stay I love my sponsored kids
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
Wow, what wonderful commentary about AI. We always appreciate your concern and love to receive your feedback (good or not-so-good). Not only are we staff CIKC members, but many of us are sponsors too, so we recognize the importance of authentic communication with your sponsored children. It’s important to us all: you, the youth, everyone who works in Kansas City and at the field offices. As Tim Bachta shared in the article, we have benefited from AI, but sponsor/child communications ARE NOT among those advancements. AI has been used by some for translations and to identify inappropriate content, but all with human intervention. If “forbidden words or phrases” are found by the software, a human manually checks the letter or card to determine if the letter can be sent to the youth or if CIKC must reject it and reach out to the sponsor to let them know. We’ve also used AI to summarize data, minimize coding for IT developers, summarize meeting notes and most recently crop photos to meet standard size requirements. Additionally, we’ve used it to leverage the AI chatbot with our global intranet, where you can ask it questions, and it'll quickly search, give you the answers, and where it's cited from. It’s also been used to organize and write meeting minutes, personally it’s been fun to find all the ways it can be used to save me time as I do my work daily. I promise though, it was not used to write this response! In fact, the partners Tim refers to in the podcast are all global employees AND our sponsors and donors.
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
@joaniedear: Yes, there are still a few instances in which our staff will pick-up sponsor for the visit and was almost always a given many years ago. However since so many sponsors are more adept at arranging their own vacations (hello google!) and at locating hotels, arranging transportation (which can also be arranged by most hotels) etc. most sponsors don't require the SOA staff to pick them up any longer. This also allows more time for the visit, since travel time does not cut into the visit hours. Especially in the Philippines where traffic is notoriously horrendous! Of course, this varies from country to country (a lot depends on where the child lives/traffic/safety) and is typically determined once the visit is in process.
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
@joaniedear: Was her "missing" brother older or younger than Hayden? I ask because the family record will only list siblings who live in the household, and since her parents do not live together it's possible that a younger brother now lives with his father or if he's older, moved out to start life. The best way to learn more about the family dynamics is to write to Hayden, as she knows you better and may feel more comfortable opening up to you. And, by not sending a memo we are not singling her out for info and it helps to reduce our administrative costs. Thanks for your understanding.
ReplyDelete@joaniedear, interesting very interesting. Do you know his name? If so, I'll do some digging and see what I can find. The issue is once a sibling is removed from your sponsored child's FR, they no longer show in your sponsored child's info. There is no "look back" in the current system. That's one of the new features we will get in the new system we are migrating to.
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
Thank you to everyone who contributed to this invaluable topic. At times, my heart broken to see pouring views of most, who knew this issue but kept in silence for sometime. Debbie, may I please request a change in letters coming from children. ALL child letters (CW, CR, CP) only be handwritten (never taking it down verbatim first in Spanish, then translating into English), then as required photo taken and attach to the CI letter template. This still happens with EG/DP follow-ups, so I don't see why the same can't be applied to their every communication with us. I'd rather see a photographic image of child's handwritten letter in Spanish, and use whatever method to translate it (by AI or an adult). We may still have doubts about the translation but at least we know and can see that the child has put their thoughts in hand-writing (i.e. 'personal touch') – THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT. They must always and only be given the opportunity to use a pen/pencil when connecting with sponsor until they graduate from the program. Btw, I promised to myself that if there can be a breakthrough coming out of this at all, a child in waiting I’m so keen to sponsor will be given a chance in honour.
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
I have taken up the matter gently with the child whose letter was without any doubt heavily edited/composed by AI, and I hope CI will forward my letter without altering it. This could make for an interesting conversation, both within the child's family and at CI centers, about AI and the importance of genuine personal communication. Now the child's voice is lost. If I ever want to converse with a robot, I can have a "dialogue" with ChatGPT! A weakness of Zambia has become a strength: most of the children enrolled in CI Lusaka's program do not have internet or personal electronic devices and are unlikely to use AI for letters.
ReplyDeleteApril 15, 2024
@elemay: I think your letter will certainly open the door to an AI conversation with your child and I believe her reply will be interesting. I do want to confirm (in case it was lost in my long response yesterday) that our staff IS NOT using it to As far as AI, we strongly advise against it being used. We will not knowingly allow AI to be used to represent a child in an image or communication. And our agencies, especially those in the Philippines where cell phone and technology is more prevalent, have been instructed not to use AI to alter a child or youth’s content. However, if a child or youth chooses to use software support to create their letter, we cannot control that. In fact we would not even be aware of it.
ReplyDeleteApril 16, 2024
@chelaka: We appreciate your feedback to my reply. However, we can’t honor your request to do so as it would be manual process that would increase our administrative fee and we can’t afford to do that. The youth and the programs mean that much to us. It’s the entire reason for our existence. Utilizing technology ethically and wisely will enable us to keep costs down and maximize funds to be used for the programs to give the kids the best chance at being healthy, educated and employed. As mentioned yesterday, we are working to create an authentic and meaningful experience in this new digital age and appreciate the feedback of our sponsors. However, as explained, AI is NOT being used by any of our staff in any of our agencies to alter or enhance the letters the youth write. In fact, our staff strongly advises against it being used by the families or youth in all our agencies, and especially in the PI where it is becoming increasingly more popular.
ReplyDeleteApril 16, 2024
Additionally, we won’t mandate how families choose to provide their letters to their sponsors, we encourage them to write a letter on paper and take a photo and send it to the field staff, if they are able to do so, but the reality is not all families have the ability due to lack of picture taking abilities or data restrictions. It’s essential to recognize that our data usage perspective differs from that of the families we serve. The reality is that many families have limited data access, so even taking, and sending one photo can wipe out precious minutes from their plan, forcing them to either run short or having to purchase more. Consequently, not all families can consistently send pictures of their letters via text or email all the time.For these reasons, families have the autonomy to choose how they provide letters to their sponsors. The options include to come to the community center to write their letters, or call and dictate them to a field worker, text them or email them. Since we moved to the approach of giving the families the freedom to provide letters and photos in a way that is best/most convenient for them, which as you know the pandemic basically dictated, we’ve seen a downturn in the number of families leaving the program due to not having the time to fulfill the semi-annual letters and one photo per year requirements to participate in the program. More kids are staying in the program, giving them a better chance at a brighter future.
ReplyDeleteApril 16, 2024
If I accidentally use ‘’forbidden words or phrases’’ in my letters, l want a person to be the one to edit( if it has to be) it, but not an AI
ReplyDeleteApril 16, 2024