AI for foundation grantmaking
The applications, 990s, audits and grantee reports go into the folder. What comes back is the due diligence memo, the ER and ED files, the docket write-ups and the logic model, with the page and document behind every number.
Casa-Alivio-docket-memo.docxExampleBoard Docket Memo: Casa Alivio, Family Health Navigation
Recommendation
Staff recommends a two-year grant of $85,000 to Casa Alivio for its family health navigation program, paid in two installments of $42,500. The program fits the second priority of our Health Access strategy, connecting uninsured families to a medical home. It served 1,140 families in 2024.
Financial position
Casa Alivio ended FY2024 with $612,000 in unrestricted cash, or 3.1 months of operating expense on a $2.37 million budget. Program expenses were 81 percent of total expenses, and the organization ran a surplus in two of the last three years. The FY2023 deficit of $96,000 followed the end of a county contract and has not recurred.
CheckedCash and expense figures tie to the FY2024 audit, pages 4 and 6. The county renewal is an open question.
How it works
- 1
Open the grant folder
The folder takes the application and its TEOS results, determination letters, the last three 990s or the audit, board lists, grant agreements, reports and your docket memo template. Fluxx, Foundant or Submittable exports go straight in.
- 2
Ask for the file you need
A due diligence schedule, an ER or ED checklist, a docket memo in your own template, or a logic model keyed to the indicators in the RFP.
- 3
Review before the board does
Each figure shows the page of the return or report it came from, and the file says what it couldn’t find or reconcile. You decide, after the call to the grantee and the site visit, what the board actually sees.
Ask it for
“Read Trailhead Youth Housing’s last three Form 990s and chart months of cash, program expense ratio and the deficit trend, citing page and line.”
Trailhead-990-analysis.xlsx“Grove Street Makers Collective isn’t a 501(c)(3). Set up the $60,000 expenditure responsibility file: pre-grant inquiry, agreement terms, 990-PF report list.”
Grove-Street-ER-file.docx“For Kola Health Initiative’s equivalency determination file, pull together what counsel’s opinion or the practitioner’s advice must cover and what’s missing.”
Kola-ED-checklist.xlsx“Casa Alivio’s $85,000 request is on the September 18 board agenda. Draft the docket memo with strategy fit, the financials and open questions.”
Casa-Alivio-docket-memo.docx“Put River Bend Family Center’s year-two report next to its proposal and budget. Flag every line off by more than 10% and list what the report never addresses.”
RiverBend-report-review.xlsx“Turn the Ready Readers RFP indicators into a logic model with outputs, outcomes, an unduplicated count definition and a matched comparison group design.”
Ready-Readers-logic-model.docx
Inside the Foundation Grantmaking mode
Grantee due diligence and recommendation
Sets up the diligence file with the tax status check, the board list and three years of 990 figures, and drafts the recommendation memo the docket carries.
Program evaluation
The logic model follows the funder’s indicators, the unduplicated count gets a written definition, and the review spells out what a grantee never addressed.
- Office skills
- Excel, Word, PowerPoint, PDF
- Tools
- Read, edit and write files, Search files, Run code, Search and read the web, View images
- Connectors
- SharePoint, Google Drive, Gmail, and additional custom connectors
- House style
- Your fonts, layouts and rules, on every file
Who it’s for
Program officers, grants staff and corporate giving managers at private, community and corporate foundations and United Ways.
Questions
Will it score applications or decline anyone?
No, scoring and decline decisions stay with your reviewers, panels and board, as funders’ own guidance on AI expects. It drafts the summaries, schedules and memos those decisions rest on, and each names its sources.
Can it confirm an applicant is tax-exempt?
Yes, it reads the IRS Tax Exempt Organization Search results, the determination letter and the filed 990 in your folder, and each answer points to the document it came from. Anything it couldn’t confirm gets flagged. The reliance decision on Pub 78 data stays with you.
Who signs the equivalency determination?
Your officers sign it, and their signature rests on current written advice from a qualified tax practitioner. The mode organizes the record and checks it against what the regulation says the advice must cover, then lists the gaps. Ultramarine Work prepares the file and stops there, because the advice is the practitioner’s to give and the determination is your officers’ to sign.
Where do proposal and grantee files go?
Ultramarine Work changes files only in the project’s folder. When a request needs it, it can read files elsewhere on your computer, never passwords, keys or app data, and you can turn that off in settings. The model runs on Paper Instruments’ servers, so the content it works on is sent there to be processed. Paper Instruments is SOC 2 Type II, and our security and compliance details are on our compliance page.
Will it catch a fake application or a forged letter?
No, and nothing can promise that. It reads every document in the folder and checks the budget arithmetic. Where the narrative and the attachments disagree, it says so, and it names whatever it could not verify. Verifying the determination letter on the IRS tool is still your step before the file goes to the board.