Ohio · Nonprofit
FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS
FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS (Ohio) receives grants from 131 organizations whose IRS filings report $40,810,868 to it, the largest being THE HASLAM 3 FOUNDATION INC ($9,150,000). 89 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $6.7M
- Funders on record
- 131
- Grants received
- $41M
- Net assets
- $66M
What Friends of Breakthrough Schools does
Mission
Our mission is to perform fundraising and advocacy activities that exclusively support the opertions and growth of the breakthrough public schools management organization and all its member schools.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
Friends of Breakthrough Schools, and prior to that, friends of e prep, has a long history of raising funds to fill the gap between the inequitable funding the government provides to the charter schools and what is actually needed. The agency currently raises funds for five charter schools.
$5,329,605 spentof which $2,190,000 as grants$1,963,082 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $5,329,605.
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 $75M to $121M (+61%).
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.
62% of FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS’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. 1 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
Susan Ertle
Executive director
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 37 funders to 58 funders, grant income fell $5.5M → $3.9M.
19 of 131 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 26% 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: $89k from one payer (the payer shares this organization's board, largest Breakthrough Public Schools). These are real filings, and they are not money FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS raised.
From the IRS filings of FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 131 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
FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 22% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
34% 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 FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 55% · 2018 41% · 2019 42% · 2020 29% · 2021 19% · 2022 30% · 2023 20% — 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
55% of FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 68% 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
50% of FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS's grant income comes from Ohio funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $10M arriving through sponsors registered in 11 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
FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS's revenue fell 53% between 2017 and 2025.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 9,615 education nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Organizations like FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS
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 Ohio
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
75% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
58%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Part of a family of 3 related entities
- Fob Real Estate LLC · disregarded
- Fob Real Estate II Inc · exempt
- Fob Real Estate III Inc · exempt
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS: 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 FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS?
- FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS (Ohio) receives grants from 131 organizations whose IRS filings report $40,810,868 to it, the largest being THE HASLAM 3 FOUNDATION INC ($9,150,000). 89 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS have?
- IRS filings report 131 organizations giving $40,810,868 in grants to FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS, 89 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS?
- THE HASLAM 3 FOUNDATION INC is the largest funder on record, with $9,150,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like FRIENDS OF BREAKTHROUGH SCHOOLS find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Ohio. 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 131 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