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Colorado · Nonprofit

Denver Urban Debate League

Denver Urban Debate League (Colorado) receives grants from 13 organizations whose IRS filings report $368,326 to it, the largest being COLORADO GIVES FOUNDATION ($177,539). 7 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 69% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.

Revenue FY2025
$90k
Funders on record
13
Grants received
$368k
Net assets
$16k
7/13 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 63%
01What it does

What Denver Urban Debate League does

Mission

Denver Urban Debate League programs break barriers for underserved students by enriching educational and personal outcomes for students of color and low-income students. Urban debate engages students, offering them experiences that they cannot always get in the classroom. Speech and debate programs teach students to develop a growth mindset, a set of attitudes that is strongly associated with success in life. In fostering academic skills and resiliency DUDL exists to ensure students graduate from and excel in high school and beyond. DUDL students become active and engaged citizens, well versed in issues of equity and public policy, equipped to interact critically with the world around them, make a difference in their communities, and add more diverse voices to our civil discourse.

As stated on its FY2025 Form 990-EZ.

Programs

  1. Tournament Conduction - This benefits the entire student body participating in the organization. The services provided are securing location, providing meals, supplies, and judges for the tournaments, and overall hosting of each tournament so that tournament operations run smoothly and efficiently.

    $91,955 spent
    100% of program spending
  2. Program Devpment and awards - each year the organization has an annual awards banquet where specific students receive recognition for their accomplishments. The entire participating student body are present at the awards banquet.

  3. Debate Training - consists of after school debate practices at school sites, weekend workshops, professional development for debate mentors and coaches, voulenteer training for organization supporters and debate judges.

The 3 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990-EZ. Program spending in total: $91,955.

02The organization over time

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.

100 = 20172017 Revenue 100 ($105k) Expenses 100 ($128k) Net assets 100 ($9k)2018 Revenue 169 ($178k) Expenses 112 ($144k) Net assets 490 ($42k)2019 Revenue 122 ($129k) Expenses 117 ($151k) Net assets 236 ($20k)2020 Revenue 127 ($134k) Expenses 98 ($126k) Net assets 326 ($28k)2021 Revenue 138 ($145k) Expenses 92 ($119k) Net assets 630 ($54k)2022 Revenue 137 ($144k) Expenses 126 ($162k) Net assets 430 ($37k)2023 Revenue 125 ($132k) Expenses 116 ($148k) Net assets 236 ($20k)2024 Revenue 152 ($160k) Expenses 126 ($162k) Net assets 206 ($18k)2025 Revenue 86 ($90k) Expenses 72 ($92k) Net assets 184 ($16k)
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Revenue (86)Expenses (72)Net assets (184)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 2017 to 2018, from $9k to $42k (+390%).

$9k
$42k
$20k
$48k
$54k
$37k
$20k
$18k
$16k
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
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.

2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

100% of Denver Urban Debate League’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (65% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 26,798 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 6 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.

−$23k
’17
$34k
’18
−$22k
’19
$8k
’20
$26k
’21
−$17k
’22
−$17k
’23
−$3k
’24
−$2k
’25
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 2 funders to 5 funders, grant income rose $26k → $45k.

6 of 13 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 69% 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 Denver Urban Debate League’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

Denver Urban Debate League leans on a few funders — its largest provides 48% of grant income and the top three 72%; half comes from just 2 funders.

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

80% 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 Denver Urban Debate League.

48%
largest funder
72%
top three
~4
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 61% · 2018 62% · 2019 31% · 2020 64% · 2021 39% · 2022 59% · 2023 48% — diversifying over time.

“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

50% of Denver Urban Debate League's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 54% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y+4y+5y

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

69% of Denver Urban Debate League'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 $113k that is directly attributable, 88% of it comes from funders outside Colorado, across 5 states.

IL
CO
DC
OK
FL

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

’18
’19
’21
’22
’23
Colorado out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $255k arriving through sponsors registered in 4 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

Denver Urban Debate League receives grants from 13 organizations whose IRS filings report $368k to it.

Operating margin−2% · below the median
Revenue growth (annualized)−2% · below the median

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 17,277 education nonprofits under $100k, FY2025

Organizations like Denver Urban Debate League

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 Colorado

Nationally

05Profile & governance

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

Public support

100%

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 Denver Urban Debate League: 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 Denver Urban Debate League?
Denver Urban Debate League (Colorado) receives grants from 13 organizations whose IRS filings report $368,326 to it, the largest being COLORADO GIVES FOUNDATION ($177,539). 7 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 69% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
How many funders does Denver Urban Debate League have?
IRS filings report 13 organizations giving $368,326 in grants to Denver Urban Debate League, 7 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of Denver Urban Debate League?
COLORADO GIVES FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $177,539 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like Denver Urban Debate League find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Colorado. 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 Denver Urban Debate League →

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 13 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