Massachusetts · Nonprofit
CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC
CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC (Massachusetts) receives grants from 8 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,397,714 to it, the largest being THE WALTER S & LUCIENNE B DRISKILL FOUNDATION ($3,065,205). 4 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $537k
- Funders on record
- 8
- Grants received
- $3.4M
- Net assets
- $526k
What Creative Education Foundation Inc does
Mission
To spark personal and professional transformation by empowering people with the skill set, tool set, and mindset of deliberate creativity.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
The foundation conducts two annual, international creativity conferences - the florida creativity conference (flcc) and the creative problem solving institute (cpsi) - which welcome hundreds of participants and which present deliberate creativity and creative leadership workshops for personal and professional development. The creativity skills and tools taught at flcc and cpsi apply across sectors and to both personal and professional challenges.
$288,003 spent$187,577 earned by the program75% of program spendingThe foundation publishes the academic journal entitled the "journal of creative behavior (jcb)" quarterly. The journal includes scholarship and current research in creative thinking and practice. For more than five decades, the jcb has been the benchmark academic periodical in the field. It provides up to date, cutting edge academic research about creativity in education, psychology, business, the arts, and more.
$21,220 spent$75,073 earned by the program6% of program spendingCef provides education services through training and consulting about creative thinking techniques and how people can develop creativity environments to support creative problem solving and innovation: 1. Cef's educator training programs trains educators how to integrate creative problem solving tools and skills in the classroom. 2. Cef's educator facilitation programs facilitate educational administrators in creative problem solving so they can build innovative solutions to complex challenges and opportunities. 3. Cef's youthwise program teaches young people how to apply creative problem solving and other deliberate creativity techniques throughout their lives. 4. Cef's noller prize recognizes cutting edge research in the field of creativity and innovation.
$74,777 spent$29,765 earned by the program19% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2025 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $384,000.
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 2019 to 2020, from $927k to $1.1M (+15%).
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: 2020 1% · 2021 16%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
43% of CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC’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. 6 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
Mary E Miller
Executive director
Board chair
Tricia Garwood
Chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2017 and FY2018 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2018 → 2023: the base broadened from 1 funder to 4 funders, grant income rose $8k → $3.1M.
5 of 8 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 10% 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 CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC’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
CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC leans on a few funders — its largest provides 90% of grant income and the top three 99%; 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: 2018 100% · 2019 100% · 2020 99% · 2021 66% · 2022 87% · 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
75% of CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC's funders are still giving 1 year after their first grant; 50% 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
CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC draws 100% of its grant income from funders outside Massachusetts, across 2 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $329k 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
CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC is better cushioned 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 CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC
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 Massachusetts
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
59% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
93%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 4 states
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC: 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 CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC?
- CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC (Massachusetts) receives grants from 8 organizations whose IRS filings report $3,397,714 to it, the largest being THE WALTER S & LUCIENNE B DRISKILL FOUNDATION ($3,065,205). 4 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC have?
- IRS filings report 8 organizations giving $3,397,714 in grants to CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC, 4 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC?
- THE WALTER S & LUCIENNE B DRISKILL FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $3,065,205 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like CREATIVE EDUCATION FOUNDATION INC find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Massachusetts. 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 Creative Education →
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