At the 21st YMCA World Council in Toronto in July 2026, the worldwide YMCA Movement engaged extensively on the topic of AI: this update shares the outcomes of those conversations. The conversations affirmed that the YMCA Movement is ready to engage with AI, but we must do so in a way that is grounded in our values and supports Vision 2030. As one of the world’s largest civil society movements, we also have a role to play in shaping how AI is discussed and governed in the wider world. The conversations did not begin in Toronto in July 2026. We arrived carrying a strategy and a vision that our Y-AI Strategy team has been building with and for the Movement over the past two years, grounded in World YMCA’s Learning, Innovation & Impact (LII) Movement Support Function and anchored firmly in Vision 2030. Toronto was not our starting point — it was a continuation of work already underway, and a chance to test and strengthen it together.
About Y-AI
Y-AI is the global YMCA’s developing AI strategy, shaped with and for the whole Movement. It sits within World YMCA’s Learning, Innovation & Impact (LII) function. A Y-AI strategy group made up of members from across the Movement and partner organisations leads and guides this work. Our vision: A stronger, more impactful YMCA, using AI to advance Vision 2030, better serve young people and communities, and shape values-led conversations about AI and its impact on society.
Our four strategic priorities
- Building confidence and capability to use AI
- Equipping YMCA leaders for an AI-enabled future
- Developing practical AI tools that meet t he needs of the Movement
- Connecting people and partners across the YMCA and beyond
What we have done so far
- Launched Y-AI within LII, and developed partnerships with organisations including Anthropic, AWS, and HP
- Formed the Y-AI Strategy team, bringing together colleagues from across the Movement with AI leaders from our partner organisations
- Piloted Claude, an AI tool by Anthropic, across the Movement
- Listened to the Movement through listening sessions, a Movement-wide survey, and ongoing dialogue with partners and colleagues, to understand needs, opportunities, and challenges
- Used this to shape a process for dialogue (‘Padare’) across the Movement, creating space to work together as we navigate these new challenges and opportunities, starting at World Council in Toronto
- Started exploring AI tools for the Movement including building a Y-AI Programme Library: a prototype tool, built with Y-USA, Anthropic, and AWS, that will let YMCAs search and learn from programmes running elsewhere in the Movement
What we are hearing
At World Council and beyond, a few themes came through strongly:
Our YMCAs
- Comfort and readiness with AI vary widely across the Movement. That’s our starting point
- AI should support human relationships and free up staff time for communities. Human oversight matters most for safeguarding and vulnerable people
- Data privacy, legal risk, and security are non-negotiable
- YMCAs need governance, policy, and training frameworks they can use. The Movement wants to build these together: shared tools, shared practice, shared training
- Under-resourced regions and YMCAs can start small: conversations, administrative tasks, and individual exploration are a good entry point
- Equitable access means making sure the hardware to run AI tools, and affordable pricing as those tools mature, don’t leave some YMCAs behind
Our communities
- Workforce, youth employment, and well-being are front of mind, especially the risk of AI eroding entry-level work for young people
- AI’s environmental footprint, including energy use and data centres, is core to this work
Our world
- The Movement’s scale and reach is an opportunity to shape the wider conversation on AI, grounded in Vision 2030 and focused on the type of world we want to be part of building together
What’s next: The ‘Padare’ process (2026-2027)
World Council was the first Movement-wide step in something bigger. We are calling it the Padare Process: a way for the whole Movement to shape this strategy together. World YMCA’s role is to support and guide this process.
| Phase | When | Description / Output |
| 1. World Council Dialogues | July 2026 | First Movement input — themes and tensions surfaced from two AI sessions in Toronto |
| 2. Movement-wide Dialogue | October 2026 – January 2027 | The Movement continues the conversation: join the Padare (see sign-up below) |
| 3. Sensemaking & Co-Creation | February – June 2027 | Outputs will be identified during the process, likely including a Shared Values Statement and Guidance Framework, reviewed across the Movement |
| 4. Affirmation & Launch | August – September 2027 | Movement-wide launch |
What we are asking of the YMCA Movement
The strategy and vision that brought us this far were never meant to be ours alone to carry — they belong to the whole Movement, and so does what comes next. Here is what we are asking YMCA members now:
- Join Phase 2. Sign up to take part in the Movement-Wide Dialogue, opening in October 2026. Register your interest here.
- Share this communication. Bring these themes to your local, national, and regional/area YMCAs, and tell us if we’ve missed something
- Stay in touch. Reach out any time with questions, ideas, or feedback — this strategy is stronger when it’s shaped continually by all of us.
Contact Kelly@ymca.int and Chad@ymca.int