Kakao said on Wednesday it is recruiting participants for its KakaoTech NGO AI Class to help strengthen artificial intelligence capabilities of activists at domestic non-profit organisations (NGOs).

The programme expands the scope of KakaoTech AI School Boss Class, which it ran last year for small business owners, to the non-profit social sector. It is part of Kakao's digital inclusion strategy to bring digital work automation and data analysis infrastructure to NGO field sites with relatively limited access to technology, and raise efficiency in creating social value.

Eligible applicants are activists at non-profit social groups such as registered non-profit private organisations, associations and foundations in South Korea. Kakao will accept applications through its official sustainability management website until Aug. 9 and plans to select 100 participants from 50 organisations. Participation will be fully free of charge.

A key feature of the class is that it is designed for a leader-level staff member and a working-level staff member from each organisation to participate together as a two-person team. The aim is to go beyond short-term improvement of individual job skills and have the paired growth of two activists lead to process improvements and tangible organisational change across their group.

Training will be held offline over two days at Kakao AI Campus, Pangyo Agit. It consists of a hands-on curriculum in two stages, including an introductory course and an advanced course.

The introductory course, held on Sept. 2, will cover basic AI use and key techniques to improve work efficiency at non-profit sites, including analysis of the latest trends, drawing insights, and analysing media coverage, bills, policies and research reports. Participants will then go through a one-week period to apply what they learned in their actual work.

Participants will then attend the advanced course on either Sept. 8 or Sept. 9, where they will conduct customised practical training to solve real issues faced at NGO sites using AI. It will be run around practical case examples for fully introducing generative AI into organisational work, including building an AI assistant, work automation, content production and presentation material creation.

Kakao will cover a one-month subscription fee for Claude Pro, a paid AI service, for all those who complete the training. It also plans to run a dedicated open chat room for one month after the programme ends so participants can communicate with instructors and organisers and share work-related questions and answers. A networking programme to share experiences among participating organisations will also be run in parallel.

Hongsin Hong (홍신), performance leader for Kakao's environment, social and governance (ESG) cooperation, said, "We prepared training tailored to NGO sites so that activists' growth can lead to organisational change." He added, "We will continue to strengthen digital capabilities of various members of society based on AI technology and contribute to creating social value."