California · Nonprofit
CORE DISTRICTS
CORE DISTRICTS (California) receives grants from 10 organizations whose IRS filings report $35,277,183 to it, the largest being GATES FOUNDATION ($30,815,202). 4 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $8.1M
- Funders on record
- 10
- Grants received
- $35M
- Net assets
- $6.1M
What Core Districts does
Mission
To assist participating school districts to work together to innovate, implement and scale new strategies and tools to help students succeed and meet the challenges of the 21st century.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Improvement networks:capability building programs is a program that offers several opportunities for educators to learn and develop skills in continuous improvement to tackle specific problems of practice in their local contexts.breakthrough success community is a program aimed at improving 9th graders on track readiness for college and career. Through learning sessions, site team meetings, action periods, and monthly reporting, schools that opt into the program work on improving 5 critical areas that determine 9th grade student success: supportive 8th-9th grade transition; freshman success teaming; strong student-adult relationships; master scheduling practice; and grading practices.
$4,441,916 spentof which $346,956 as grants$1,867,284 earned by the program70% of program spendingData analytics:insights dashboard is a program developed to refine the calculation at the heart of core's multiple measures accountability system as well as building capacity for systemic success.data collaborative is a collaborative between participating leas (districts, charter leas and additional networks) focused on improving student outcomes. The data collaborative's long-term goal is for all california students to have strong support, effective programming, and an educational community standing together by their side so that they can achieve and succeed in college and career. Work toward this goal is supported by facilitating inter- and intra-district data collaboration that will help identify and address inequities in educational experiences and outcomes. The hope is to support member districts (which include approximately 1.2 million students) to adapt this work for local school report cards that will enable parents, students, educators and leaders to understand and respond to matters of school quality.support index is a collaborative project that will leverage the full data set in the core data collaborative, which includes over two million students across 150 leas…
$1,445,054 spent$245,835 earned by the program23% of program spendingCore schoolsfuture forward secondary education systems is a 10-year body of work that core is undertaking. Four participating districts are convening community based design teams to learn from research, and successful models from around the country, to fundamentally redesign the secondary teaching and learning experience so that high school students can demonstrate skills mastery and preparedness for tomorrow's world.
$436,277 spent7% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $6,323,247.
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 2020 to 2021, from $6.2M to $8.2M (+31%).
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.
54% of CORE DISTRICTS’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (48% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 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.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base narrowed from 4 funders to 2 funders, grant income fell $4.2M → $4.0M.
2 of 10 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 5% 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 CORE DISTRICTS’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
CORE DISTRICTS leans on a few funders — its largest provides 87% of grant income and the top three 95%; half comes from just 1 funder.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 1 funder to its left
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 72% · 2018 94% · 2019 76% · 2020 83% · 2021 100% · 2022 100% · 2023 100% — 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
29% of CORE DISTRICTS's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 40% 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
CORE DISTRICTS draws 92% of its grant income from funders outside California, across 2 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.6M arriving through sponsors registered in 2 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
CORE DISTRICTS holds deeper cash reserves than three-quarters of the 9,398 education nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 9,398 education nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Organizations like CORE DISTRICTS
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
86% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
7%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for CORE DISTRICTS: 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 CORE DISTRICTS?
- CORE DISTRICTS (California) receives grants from 10 organizations whose IRS filings report $35,277,183 to it, the largest being GATES FOUNDATION ($30,815,202). 4 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does CORE DISTRICTS have?
- IRS filings report 10 organizations giving $35,277,183 in grants to CORE DISTRICTS, 4 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of CORE DISTRICTS?
- GATES FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $30,815,202 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like CORE DISTRICTS 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.
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 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