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Utah · Nonprofit

Boulder Outdoor Survival School

Boulder Outdoor Survival School (Utah) receives grants from 10 organizations whose IRS filings report $152,996 to it, the largest being The Community Foundation of Utah ($58,834). 3 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 98% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.

Revenue FY2024
$469k
Funders on record
10
Grants received
$153k
Net assets
$584k
3/10 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 6%
01What it does

What Boulder Outdoor Survival School does

Mission

The Boulder Outdoor Survival School is dedicated to the instruction and preservation of traditional living skills and the development of people through experiences within the natural world.

As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.

Program

  1. Boulder Outdoor Survival School (boss) is an organization that teaches outdoor survival techniques and respect for the natural habitat. Most classes take place in rural utah. The school serves approximately 120-150 students per year in highly intensive multi-week training courses. Boss teaches students essential survival skills such as navigation, fire by friction, shelter building, survival priorities, water procurement and treatment, and food gathering (plants, trapping, fishing). The organization teaches several different types of courses: 1) the field course, 2) the skills course, 3) the hunter gatherer course, and 4) the navigator course.

    $431,157 spent
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $431,157.

02The organization over time

The organization over time

Each line starts at 100 in 2018, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2018, 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.

100 = 20182018 Revenue 100 ($794k) Expenses 100 ($434k) Net assets 100 ($391k)2019 Revenue 48 ($380k) Expenses 93 ($404k) Net assets 94 ($368k)2020 Revenue 44 ($352k) Expenses 53 ($231k) Net assets 125 ($489k)2021 Revenue 78 ($623k) Expenses 105 ($455k) Net assets 168 ($657k)2022 Revenue 64 ($508k) Expenses 123 ($535k) Net assets 161 ($630k)2023 Revenue 78 ($616k) Expenses 131 ($567k) Net assets 173 ($676k)2024 Revenue 59 ($469k) Expenses 129 ($561k) Net assets 149 ($584k)
2018201920202021202220232024
Revenue (59)Expenses (129)Net assets (149)Peer revenue range

Balance sheet

Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2019 to 2020, from $645k to $877k (+36%).

$747k
$645k
$877k
$1.0M
$991k
$1.0M
$888k
2018201920202021202220232024
Total assetsTotal liabilities

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.

2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

Government-grant reliance: 2020 24% · 2021 16% · 2022 1%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.

32% of Boulder Outdoor Survival School’s revenue is contributions — more earned-revenue than three-quarters of its peers (88% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 4,629 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 7 reported years ran a deficit.

$360k
’18
−$24k
’19
$121k
’20
$169k
’21
−$27k
’22
$49k
’23
−$92k
’24
2.9
months of
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.

Board chair

Michael Denisoff

Chairman

As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.

2018201920202021202220232024
Listed551011131111
Joined·+0+5+1+5+0+2
No longer listed·000322
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 1 funder to 3 funders, grant income rose $8k → $9k.

7 of 10 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 98% 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 Boulder Outdoor Survival School’s funders (the co-funder graph). 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

Boulder Outdoor Survival School leans on a few funders — its largest provides 38% of grant income and the top three 83%; half comes from just 2 funders.

the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left

98% 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 Boulder Outdoor Survival School.

38%
largest funder
83%
top three
~3
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 100% · 2018 100% · 2019 55% · 2020 99% · 2021 68% · 2022 99% · 2023 99% — 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

20% of Boulder Outdoor Survival School's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 30% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y

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

98% of Boulder Outdoor Survival School's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $3k that is directly attributable, 100% of it comes from funders outside Utah, across 3 states.

IL
NY
OH

In-state vs out-of-state, by year

’20
’22
’23
Utah out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $150k arriving through sponsors registered in 7 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.

04Its place in the field

Against its field

Boulder Outdoor Survival School's revenue fell 41% between 2018 and 2024.

Operating margin−20% · bottom quartile
Months of reserve2.9mo · bottom quartile
Revenue growth (annualized)−8% · bottom quartile

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 4,264 environment nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2024

Organizations like Boulder Outdoor Survival School

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 Utah

Nationally

05Profile & governance

Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.

Where the money goes

77% of spending goes to programs.

Program 77%Management 12%Fundraising 11%

Governance

10
board members
100%
independent
✓Conflict-of-interest policy–Whistleblower policy✓Document retention✓Board reviewed the 990–Audited financials

Public support

99%

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 Boulder Outdoor Survival School: 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.

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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 Boulder Outdoor Survival School?
Boulder Outdoor Survival School (Utah) receives grants from 10 organizations whose IRS filings report $152,996 to it, the largest being The Community Foundation of Utah ($58,834). 3 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 98% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
How many funders does Boulder Outdoor Survival School have?
IRS filings report 10 organizations giving $152,996 in grants to Boulder Outdoor Survival School, 3 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of Boulder Outdoor Survival School?
The Community Foundation of Utah is the largest funder on record, with $58,834 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like Boulder Outdoor Survival School find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Utah. 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 Boulder Outdoor Survival School →

These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2018–2024), and the filings of 10 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 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing