# Janet Kowalski, Development Director at Lakeshore Youth Initiative — read of Nonprofit AI, May 8 2026

> 14 years in development, currently managing a $1.2M annual fund at a 10-staff youth services nonprofit in Milwaukee. Running Bloomerang, three Google Sheets I no longer trust, and a volunteer scheduling system my coordinator hates.

## How I got here

Someone in the AFP Wisconsin Facebook group posted a screenshot of the grant calendar feature and said it was the first thing that actually replaced her shared spreadsheet without a six-month onboarding process. I clicked through to see what she was talking about. I had twelve minutes before a board call and spent nine of them on this page instead of reviewing my notes.

## What I clicked first

"A mid-level donor quietly stops giving and nobody notices for six months because there is no single view of engagement history." That sentence made me stop scrolling. That is not marketing copy. That is a specific thing that happened to me in 2023 with a donor who had been giving $500 a year for seven years, and I only found out she had lapsed when I was pulling the annual fund list for the appeal. I kept reading after that.

## Where I paused

The step-by-step setup section. "Up and running in one afternoon." I have read that exact sentence about four different tools and it has never been true. But they actually describe the three steps, and the steps are specific enough that I can mentally simulate doing them. "Nonprofit AI maps the data automatically and flags duplicates for a one-click review." Okay. That is a real problem I have with Bloomerang imports. I do not believe one afternoon but I believe it is faster than six months, and that matters.

## What I distrusted

The testimonials. Sarah M., Development Director, youth literacy nonprofit, Denver. Marcus T., Executive Director, food access organization, Atlanta. No last names. No org names. "Sarah M." is doing a lot of work here. I have been burned before by a tool that had glowing testimonials from what turned out to be the founders' friends. I would want to see the actual organization name. "Youth literacy nonprofit, Denver" is not a verifiable entity. If Sarah is real and got results, tell me the name of her organization and I will look her up on LinkedIn myself.

Also: "AI-drafted acknowledgment letters that match your organization's voice." How? How does it learn my organization's voice? Do I paste in samples? Does it read my past emails? This is left completely unexplained, and "the personal tone that keeps longtime donors loyal" is exactly the kind of phrase I would write in a grant proposal when I have no specifics to offer. That section needed one more sentence of explanation.

The "300+ nonprofits" number is doing very little for me. 300 orgs could be 300 one-person shops who signed up for a free trial and never converted. What is the retention rate? What is the average org size?

## What would convince me

One named, callable reference at a nonprofit similar to mine in size and mission. Not "youth literacy nonprofit, Denver." I want "Big Brothers Big Sisters of Northern Colorado, ask for their development director Tamara." I would call Tamara. One real phone call from a peer in the sector would do more than this entire page.

Also: a short screen recording, not a polished marketing video, of someone actually importing a Bloomerang export and getting through that first-day setup. No music, no cuts, just someone doing the thing.

## What I'd ask in an email reply

1. The testimonials do not name the organizations. Can you give me one reference I can actually contact, someone running a comparable-size annual fund who has been using this for at least six months?

2. How does the "AI-drafted acknowledgment letters" feature learn the voice of my organization specifically, and can I see an example of a draft it would produce before I commit to anything?

3. We are on Bloomerang right now. If I connect via the integration rather than importing a CSV, does historical communication data come over or just gift history and contact records?

## Verdict: on-the-fence

The page communicates a real problem clearly, which puts it ahead of probably 40 of the 50 tools I have looked at this year. But the anonymized testimonials and the unexplained AI feature are enough friction that I would not reply without someone forwarding me a real reference from a peer org I trust.

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*Memo by skeptic persona, generated 2026-05-08. Studio breaks own self-grading loop.*