Google.org, the philanthropic arm of Google, on Monday unveiled a new initiative for funding nonprofits that are developing tech featuring the trendy generative AI.

Dubbed Google.org Accelerator: Generative AI, this program is to be funded with $20 million in grants and include 21 nonprofits at its launch, among them Quill.org, which is developing AI-powered tools to give student essays better feedback, and World Bank, which is designing a generative AI app to make development research more accessible.

Apart from funding, nonprofits participating in the six-month accelerator program will receive technical training, workshops, mentors and guidance from an "AI coach." Through Google.org's fellowship program, teams of Google employees will spend up to six months working full-time with three of those nonprofits—Tarjimly, Benefits Data Trust and mRelief—to help them successfully launch their proposed generative AI tools.

Tarjimly is planning to use AI to translate languages for refugees, while Benefits Data Trust is using AI to develop assistants to assist caseworkers in facilitating low-income applicants to enroll in public benefits. mRelief, meanwhile, is creating a tool to make it easier for low-income individuals to apply for the U.S. SNAP benefits.

Generative AI can help social impact teams be more productive, creative and effective in serving their communities," wrote Annie Lewin, director of global advocacy at Google.org, in a blog post. "Google.org funding recipients report that AI helps them achieve their goals in one third of the time at nearly half the cost.

According to a PwrdBy survey, 73% of nonprofits believe AI innovation can align with their missions and 75% believe AI makes their lives easier, particularly in areas like donor categorization, routine back-office tasks and "mission-driven" initiatives. Still, there exist significant barriers for nonprofits looking to build their own AI solutions or embrace third-party products — primarily cost, resources and time.

Speaking in the blog post, Lewin cites a Google.org survey that found similarly that although four in five nonprofits believe generative AI might be relevant to their work, nearly half aren't using the tech due to a variety of internal and external roadblocks. "[These nonprofits] cite a lack of tools, awareness, training and funding as the biggest barriers to adoption," she said.

Encouragingly, the count of nonprofit AI-focused startups is finally starting to tick up.

Nonprofit accelerator Fast Forward said that more than a third of applicants for its latest class were AI companies this year. And Crunchbase reports that, more broadly, dozens of nonprofit organizations around the world are committing work around ethical approaches to AI, including AI ethics lab AlgorithmWatch, virtual reading clinic JoyEducation and conservation advocacy group Earth05.