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Colorado · Nonprofit

Family Star Inc

Family Star Inc (Colorado) receives grants from 29 organizations whose IRS filings report $2,967,097 to it, the largest being MILE HIGH UNITED WAY INC ($781,093). 17 of them have funded it in more than one year.

Revenue FY2025
$7.4M
Funders on record
29
Grants received
$3.0M
Net assets
$4.0M
17/29 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 6%
01What it does

What Family Star Inc does

Mission

To discover the child in inclusive Montessori environmets and inspire a movement for educating the human potential.

As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.

Program

  1. Home to one of the rare center-based Early Head Start programs in the United States that is firmly grounded in the Montessori method. Family Star effectively unites the best practices of Montessori education with robust comprehensive services typically integrated into Head Start programs. The preschool capacity allows Family Star to serve 228 children at a time, 160 in center-based classrooms in Northeast and Northwest Denver and an additional 68 in the home-based program. Over 73% of the students and families live at or near the poverty level, and 15% of students have an identified disability or special need. Family Star levels the educational and societal playing field by giving these students and families the resources and education they need to be competitive with their peers.

    $5,582,829 spent$1,232,943 earned by the program
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2025 Form 990. Program spending in total: $5,582,829.

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 ($5.0M) Expenses 100 ($4.4M) Net assets 100 ($3.1M)2018 Revenue 105 ($5.3M) Expenses 113 ($5.0M) Net assets 106 ($3.3M)2019 Revenue 117 ($5.9M) Expenses 118 ($5.2M) Net assets 128 ($3.9M)2020 Revenue 133 ($6.7M) Expenses 133 ($5.9M) Net assets 154 ($4.7M)2021 Revenue 142 ($7.1M) Expenses 148 ($6.6M) Net assets 173 ($5.3M)2022 Revenue 138 ($6.9M) Expenses 178 ($7.9M) Net assets 142 ($4.4M)2023 Revenue 141 ($7.1M) Expenses 173 ($7.6M) Net assets 124 ($3.8M)2024 Revenue 141 ($7.1M) Expenses 172 ($7.6M) Net assets 107 ($3.3M)2025 Revenue 146 ($7.4M) Expenses 151 ($6.7M) Net assets 129 ($4.0M)
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Revenue (146)Expenses (151)Net assets (129)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 2021 to 2022, from $6.5M to $5.4M (−16%).

$4.4M
$4.6M
$5.1M
$5.9M
$6.5M
$5.4M
$4.6M
$4.0M
$4.5M
'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

Government-grant reliance: 2017 67% · 2018 67% · 2019 66% · 2020 70% · 2021 75% · 2022 79% · 2023 79% · 2024 80% · 2025 72%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.

83% of Family Star Inc’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (48% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 12,360 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.

$602k
’17
$310k
’18
$663k
’19
$800k
’20
$586k
’21
−$962k
’22
−$537k
’23
−$522k
’24
$664k
’25
2.5
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.

Chief executive

Lindsay McNicholas

Executive Director

Board chair

Jeff Jones

Chair

As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.

'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Listed111321191516141915
Joined·+2+14+3+2+5+3+7+2
No longer listed·06564526
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 5 funders to 8 funders, grant income rose $204k → $440k.

9 of 29 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 16% 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 Family Star Inc’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 28 of 29 funders by total. 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

Family Star Inc has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 26% of grant income, and it takes 3 funders to reach half.

the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 3 funders to its left

70% 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 Family Star Inc.

26%
largest funder
58%
top three
~7
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 61% · 2018 43% · 2019 31% · 2020 35% · 2021 33% · 2022 28% · 2023 39% — 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

39% of Family Star Inc's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 59% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y+4y+5y+6y

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

95% of Family Star Inc's grant income comes from Colorado funders.

MN
CA
UT
CO
MO
AR

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

’17
’18
’19
’20
’21
’22
’23
Colorado out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $461k 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

Family Star Inc runs a healthier operating margin than half of the 9,615 education nonprofits its size.

Operating margin9% · above the median
Months of reserve2.5mo · below the median
Revenue growth (annualized)5% · below the median

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 9,615 education nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025

Government funding Family Star Inc receives

Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $21.4M on record.

Federal$21.4M
grants $21.4Mcontracts $0
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
Top agencies
  • Department of Health and Human Services$21.4M

Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.

Organizations like Family Star 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 Colorado

Nationally

05Profile & governance

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

Where the money goes

83% of spending goes to programs.

Program 83%Management 14%Fundraising 2%

Governance

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

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 Family Star 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.

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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 Family Star Inc?
Family Star Inc (Colorado) receives grants from 29 organizations whose IRS filings report $2,967,097 to it, the largest being MILE HIGH UNITED WAY INC ($781,093). 17 of them have funded it in more than one year.
How many funders does Family Star Inc have?
IRS filings report 29 organizations giving $2,967,097 in grants to Family Star Inc, 17 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of Family Star Inc?
MILE HIGH UNITED WAY INC is the largest funder on record, with $781,093 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like Family Star Inc 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 Family Star →

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 29 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 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing