Montana · Nonprofit
COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL
COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL (Montana) receives grants from 8 organizations whose IRS filings report $558,966 to it, the largest being INDIAN RIVER COMMUNITY FOUNDATION INC ($400,000). 6 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 87% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2025
- $834k
- Funders on record
- 8
- Grants received
- $559k
- Net assets
- $194k
What Cottonwood Day School does
Mission
At Cottonwood Day School, our mission is to support students with learning challenges and partner with families, so students can reach their full potential academically, socially, and therapeutically in a supportive and inclusive environment.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
Cottonwood Day School in bozeman, mt is the first and only private, nonprofit elementary school for students with learning disabilities in the state of montana. Students with learning disabilities need a specific learning approach to achieve academic success. Cottonwood Day School provides a unique and exceptional learning environment to students with learning disabilities. Cottonwood Day School's specialized approach to instruction takes into consideration that each student's learning style is unique. Our comprehensive team of reading, elementary, special education teachers and speech and language therapists work collaboratively to ensure that the goals and objectives of each child's learning plan are met. Students with language based disabilities like dyslexia and other learning disabilities typically have difficulty with word recognition, decoding and spelling. These fundamental difficulties impact reading comprehension. Research indicates that scaffolded, multisensory programs are successful in teaching students with learning disabilities. The fundamentals of language and reading. At Cottonwood Day School, we integrate a multisensory approach across all academic content area…
$875,482 spentof which $32,931 as grants$453,489 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $875,482.
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 2022 to 2023, from $126k to $191k (+51%).
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 23% · 2022 7% · 2023 1%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
41% of COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (57% 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.
Chief executive
Amy Wood
Executive director
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base held at 2 funders, grant income rose $34k → $100k.
5 of 8 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 87% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
Left out of every figure on this page: $203k from one payer (the payer's own filing calls it a related party, largest Randy P & Meredith M Scully Foundation Inc). These are real filings, and they are not money COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL raised.
From the IRS filings of COTTONWOOD DAY 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
COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL leans on a few funders — its largest provides 72% of grant income and the top three 93%; half comes from just 1 funder.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 1 funder to its left
87% 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 COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 74% · 2018 100% · 2020 100% · 2021 78% · 2022 91% · 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
25% of COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL's funders are still giving 2 years after their first grant; 75% 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
87% of COTTONWOOD DAY 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 $72k that is directly attributable, 99% of it comes from funders outside Montana, across 3 states.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $487k arriving through sponsors registered in 5 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
COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL has grown faster than half of the 16,849 education nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 16,849 education nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2025
Organizations like COTTONWOOD DAY 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 Montana
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
75% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for COTTONWOOD DAY 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.
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 COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL?
- COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL (Montana) receives grants from 8 organizations whose IRS filings report $558,966 to it, the largest being INDIAN RIVER COMMUNITY FOUNDATION INC ($400,000). 6 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 87% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL have?
- IRS filings report 8 organizations giving $558,966 in grants to COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL, 6 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL?
- INDIAN RIVER COMMUNITY FOUNDATION INC is the largest funder on record, with $400,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like COTTONWOOD DAY SCHOOL find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Montana. 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 Cottonwood Day School →
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 8 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