Colorado · Nonprofit
ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND
ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND (Colorado) receives grants from 13 organizations whose IRS filings report $730,234 to it, the largest being ASPEN COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($303,903). 10 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 52% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2025
- $485k
- Funders on record
- 13
- Grants received
- $730k
- Net assets
- $305k
What Roaring Fork Valley Early Learning Fund does
Mission
To engage children from birth to age 5 in a routine of daily book sharing with their parents to foster healthy brain development, parent-child bonding, and early literacy skills critical for school and life success.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Bolsitas rojas/little red bags outreach fills a need for our most underserved children and parents. These parent-child early literacy family networks bring together families of children not enrolled in preschool. In weekly, hour-long "preschool" sessions that include parents, raising a reader staff model storytime, provide preschool activities and encourage parent engagement, positive literacy behaviors, and family dynamics and well-being at home. These sessions also include the weekly rotation of our red book bags. This program happens in our nine public libraries and one firehouse.
$164,005 spent$33,633 earned by the program51% of program spending123 let's read gifts one book per month to each participating preschool teacher and every student in their class. With each book, rar staff provides customized suggestions for home activities to stimulate brain development, enhance vocabulary, and motivate at-home reading. Each child receives seven books a year to build the all-important home library.
$32,791 spent10% of program spendingBlue bag library days introduces over 800 children who participate in one of our book programs to local libraries so they and their families can access books and other resources. Children receive a raising a reader blue library bag to keep and carry their library books to and from home. They also receive their first library card and information about summer reading programs, thus promoting lifelong public library use.
$27,807 spent9% of program spendingOur innovative, evidence-based literacy programs provide robust and equitable early childhood experiences and resources for children from aspen to parachute so that parents create a family-reading routine and a healthy home life, which prepare their child to enter kindergarten ready to learn. Our red book bags promote parent-child bonding and increase read-aloud time at home by providing families of preschool and kindergarten children with 75+ high-quality books during the school year. Each week over 600 children take home a different red bag filled with 3-4 books to read with their parents, enjoy by themselves, and return for a new bag the following week. Each bag provides resources to motivate parents to read at home with their families regularly. Our summer camp is a parent-child, early-learning parent network that has expanded into four local communities serving up to 110 families. These camps combine an outdoor experience with early childhood literacy and learning experiences.
$94,732 spentof which $26,598 as grants30% of program spending
The 4 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $319,335.
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 2023 to 2024, from $222k to $336k (+51%).
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: 2017 11% · 2018 12% · 2019 12% · 2020 30% · 2021 14% · 2022 15% · 2023 22% · 2024 29% · 2025 20%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
89% of ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (57% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 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 1 funder to 8 funders, grant income rose $38k → $156k.
4 of 13 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 52% 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 ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND’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
ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND leans on a few funders — its largest provides 42% of grant income and the top three 70%; 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 ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 100% · 2018 86% · 2019 92% · 2020 45% · 2021 44% · 2022 32% · 2023 35% — 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
71% of ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 77% 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
52% of ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND'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 $353k that is directly attributable, 77% of it comes from Colorado funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $378k arriving through sponsors registered in 2 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
ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND runs a healthier operating margin 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 ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND
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
78% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
77%
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 ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND: 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 ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND?
- ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND (Colorado) receives grants from 13 organizations whose IRS filings report $730,234 to it, the largest being ASPEN COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($303,903). 10 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 52% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND have?
- IRS filings report 13 organizations giving $730,234 in grants to ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND, 10 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND?
- ASPEN COMMUNITY FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $303,903 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like ROARING FORK VALLEY EARLY LEARNING FUND 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.
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