Colorado · Nonprofit
FRIENDS SCHOOL INC
FRIENDS SCHOOL INC (Colorado) receives grants from 17 organizations whose IRS filings report $952,344 to it, the largest being COLORADO GIVES FOUNDATION ($373,993). 10 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 70% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2025
- $4.4M
- Funders on record
- 17
- Grants received
- $952k
- Net assets
- $3.6M
What Friends School Inc does
Mission
Friend's school is a supportive, dynamic community committed to educating the whole child head, hand, and heart and to training exceptional teachers for tomorrow's classrooms. We provide a strong academic foundation while developing creative expression and nurturing a passion for learning. Our students gain a deep understanding of themselves and are inspired to act with compassion and integrity.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Educational - friends school offers an independent, nonsectarian progressive program for children in preschool through grade eight. We are leaders in social and emotional learning with a focus on mindfulness practices at all levels. Students are challenged through experiential learning, exploration and direct instruction, low student to teacher ratios, and actively involved families. Our preschool offers a warm, loving, play-based approach, setting the foundation for school readiness. In our elementary school we emphasize an experiential and gold standard project-based curriculum, focused on developing academic skills and competencies including: problem solving, critical thinking, and social responsibility. The middle school provides the optimal learning environment where students are challenged academically through our balanced program that ensures high school readiness while inspiring students to stay engaged and make a difference in the world. We also offer after school care, enrichment programs and summer camps. Overall enrollment is approximately 140 students.
$3,431,737 spent$3,695,105 earned by the program90% of program spendingTeacher candidates - friends school offers a unique teacher preparation program to aspiring teachers by providing them with practical classroom teaching experience and coursework that enables them to attain a colorado initial teacher license, as well as a master's degree in education in partnership with the university of colorado denver. This highly regarded education program places teachers in public and independent schools throughout boulder county and surrounding counties. We launch approximately 16-24 teacher candidates each year.
$377,709 spent$162,669 earned by the program10% of program spending
The 2 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $3,809,446.
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 2020 to 2021, from $7.4M to $8.7M (+17%).
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 9% · 2022 10% · 2023 5% · 2024 10% · 2025 6%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
13% of FRIENDS SCHOOL INC’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (48% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 8 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.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 3 funders to 4 funders, grant income fell $105k → $59k.
7 of 17 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 70% 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 FRIENDS SCHOOL 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
FRIENDS SCHOOL INC leans on a few funders — its largest provides 39% of grant income and the top three 69%; half comes from just 2 funders.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 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 FRIENDS SCHOOL INC.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 76% · 2018 41% · 2019 33% · 2020 31% · 2021 75% · 2022 29% · 2023 46% — 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
45% of FRIENDS SCHOOL INC's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 59% 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
70% of FRIENDS SCHOOL INC'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 $284k that is directly attributable, 82% of it comes from funders outside Colorado, across 9 states.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $668k 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
FRIENDS SCHOOL INC's revenue grew 28% between 2017 and 2025.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 9,398 education nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Organizations like FRIENDS SCHOOL 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
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
73% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for FRIENDS SCHOOL 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 FRIENDS SCHOOL INC?
- FRIENDS SCHOOL INC (Colorado) receives grants from 17 organizations whose IRS filings report $952,344 to it, the largest being COLORADO GIVES FOUNDATION ($373,993). 10 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 70% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does FRIENDS SCHOOL INC have?
- IRS filings report 17 organizations giving $952,344 in grants to FRIENDS SCHOOL INC, 10 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of FRIENDS SCHOOL INC?
- COLORADO GIVES FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $373,993 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like FRIENDS SCHOOL 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 Friends 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 17 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