California · Nonprofit
ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN
ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN (California) receives grants from 90 organizations whose IRS filings report $16,102,954 to it, the largest being THE LOWELL MILKEN FAMILY FOUNDATION ($2,899,118). 55 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $177M
- Funders on record
- 90
- Grants received
- $16M
- Net assets
- $270M
What Art Center College of Design does
Mission
Our mission is to educate, inspire, and empower creative and design leaders.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
The college operates an independent, four-year curriculum to educate artists and designers in communication arts and industrial design. The college offers a bachelor of fine arts degree in six majors (creative direction; film; fine art; graphic design; illustration; and photography and imaging) and a bachelor of science degree in five majors (entertainment design; interaction design; product design; spatial experience design; and transportation design). Graduate programs lead to the master of fine arts degree in: film; art; media design practices; and graphic design. The graduate programs that offer the master of science degree are: furniture, lighting & fixtures; spatial experience design; industrial design; and transportation systems and design. Two graduate programs award an online master of design (mdes) degree in brand design and strategy and interaction design. All expenditures relate to academic instruction, program support and operation of the college. The fte enrollment for july 2024 to june 2025 was approximately 2,188 (fall 2024), 2,068 (spring 2025) and 768 (summer 2025) students.
$145,441,528 spentof which $29,343,983 as grants$141,324,251 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $145,441,528.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2018 to 2019, from $273M to $330M (+21%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2018 0% · 2019 0% · 2020 2% · 2021 3% · 2022 4% · 2023 0% · 2024 0% · 2025 0%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
15% of ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (14% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Chief executive
Karen Hofmann
President/CEO
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 31 funders to 39 funders, grant income rose $947k → $2.5M.
16 of 90 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 14% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 90 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 18% of grant income, and it takes 6 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 6 funders to its left
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 21% · 2018 18% · 2019 20% · 2020 21% · 2021 36% · 2022 28% · 2023 24% — growing more concentrated.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
57% of ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 61% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
79% of ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN's grant income comes from California funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $2.2M arriving through sponsors registered in 12 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN runs a healthier operating margin than half of the 684 education nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 684 education nonprofits over $100M, FY2025
Government funding ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $15.1M on record.
- Department of Education$14.7M
- Institute of Museum and Library Services$223k
- National Endowment for the Arts$165k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
94% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
52%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Part of a family of 2 related entities
- Artcenter Global LLC · disregarded
- Art Center College of Design Consulting (Beijing) Co Ltd · corp_trust
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN?
- ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN (California) receives grants from 90 organizations whose IRS filings report $16,102,954 to it, the largest being THE LOWELL MILKEN FAMILY FOUNDATION ($2,899,118). 55 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN have?
- IRS filings report 90 organizations giving $16,102,954 in grants to ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN, 55 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN?
- THE LOWELL MILKEN FAMILY FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $2,899,118 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Art Center College of Design →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 90 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing