Arizona · Nonprofit
BE A LEADER FOUNDATION
BE A LEADER FOUNDATION (Arizona) receives grants from 60 organizations whose IRS filings report $6,453,376 to it, the largest being ARIZONA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($816,030). 37 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $2.6M
- Funders on record
- 60
- Grants received
- $6.5M
- Net assets
- $6.3M
What Be a Leader Foundation does
Mission
Be A Leader's mission is to empower students to access, navigate, and succeed in college.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
Our vision is that every student has the skills, tools, and opportunities to achieve their life goals. Guided by our mission to empower students to access, navigate, and succeed in postsecondary education, Be A Leader Foundation provides college access, postsecondary transition, and college success services, now reaching well over 14,000 students a year. Our theory of change rests on the belief that providing students with guidance, mentorship, access to resources, and empowerment meaningfully enhances their chances of pursuing postsecondary education. Our students carry tremendous potential, but often lack the external support and resources needed to complete the college-going equation. Caring adults are central to how we close that gap our volunteers serve as mentors who help guide college-going conversations with students, while senior boot camp coaches play a crucial role in helping seniors meet critical deadlines throughout their final year.
$1,476,935 spentof which $43,700 as grants$55,991 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2025 Form 990. Program spending in total: $1,476,935.
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 2021 to 2022, from $3.7M to $5.0M (+32%).
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: 2021 36% · 2022 65% · 2023 13% · 2024 9% · 2025 2%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
91% of BE A LEADER FOUNDATION’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (88% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 2 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
Soilo J Felix
President & CEO
Board chair
Melissa B Trujillo
Chair/treasurer
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 15 funders to 19 funders, grant income rose $334k → $617k.
11 of 60 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 15% 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 BE A LEADER FOUNDATION’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 60 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
BE A LEADER FOUNDATION has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 13% 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
62% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund BE A LEADER FOUNDATION.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 22% · 2018 44% · 2019 24% · 2020 22% · 2021 35% · 2022 35% · 2023 23% — broadly stable.
“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
40% of BE A LEADER FOUNDATION's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 62% 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
78% of BE A LEADER FOUNDATION's grant income comes from Arizona funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $998k arriving through sponsors registered in 9 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
BE A LEADER FOUNDATION runs a healthier operating margin than three-quarters of the 543 public benefit nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 543 public benefit nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Organizations like BE A LEADER FOUNDATION
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 Arizona
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
77% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
83%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for BE A LEADER FOUNDATION: 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 BE A LEADER FOUNDATION?
- BE A LEADER FOUNDATION (Arizona) receives grants from 60 organizations whose IRS filings report $6,453,376 to it, the largest being ARIZONA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($816,030). 37 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does BE A LEADER FOUNDATION have?
- IRS filings report 60 organizations giving $6,453,376 in grants to BE A LEADER FOUNDATION, 37 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of BE A LEADER FOUNDATION?
- ARIZONA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $816,030 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like BE A LEADER FOUNDATION find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Arizona. 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 Be a Leader →
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 60 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