California · Nonprofit
Ten Strands
Ten Strands (California) receives grants from 67 organizations whose IRS filings report $13,808,326 to it, the largest being CALIFORNIA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($3,251,050). 51 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $4.4M
- Funders on record
- 67
- Grants received
- $14M
- Net assets
- $3.8M
What Ten Strands does
Mission
We strengthen the partnerships, strategies, and systems that advance environmental literacy, ensuring all California TK12 students thrive in sustainable, resilient schools and engage in meaningful environmental learning experiences, both in and beyond the classroom.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Climate Change and Environmental Justice Program (CCEJP), now known as Seeds to Solutions: Ten Strands served as the lead consultant for the Climate Change and Environmental Justice Program (CCEJP), now known as Seeds to Solutions, a statewide initiative to develop standards-based K12 instructional resources focused on climate change and environmental justice. The program is led by the San Mateo County Office of Education in partnership with the California Department of Education. Between FY23 and FY25, Ten Strands coordinated community-based writing teams and subject matter experts to complete development of the curriculum. With the publication of the materials, Ten Strands is now supporting the statewide rollout of Seeds to Solutions to ensure the resources reach educators and students across California. Found at: https://seedstosolutions.org/
$1,526,264 spent49% of program spendingYouth engagement: Ten Strands advanced youth engagement through the California Youth Climate Policy Leadership Program (CYCP) and a student internship program. During FY25, more than forty high school students from nine regions across California participated in CYCP, receiving training and mentorship to design and lead local civic engagement and leadership projects related to climate literacy and school sustainability. Ten Strands also provided internship opportunities for high school and college students to gain hands-on experience supporting research, communications, and policy education work, strengthening a statewide youth leadership pipeline. Partners in this work include Sierra Club California and UndauntedK12. Found at: https://tenstrands.org/work/youth-engagement/Technical assistance services: Ten Strands provided targeted technical assistance to school districts and county offices of education to support planning and implementation of whole-school sustainability strategies, including environmental and climate literacy, youth leadership, and sustainable practices. These services helped education leaders overcome implementation barriers, scale promising practices, and build…
$745,313 spent$281,958 earned by the program24% of program spendingOutdoor learning initiatives: Ten Strands advanced three interconnected initiatives related to outdoor learning, with a primary focus on the California Campaign for Outdoor Learning. Through this campaign, Ten Strands convened leaders across education, health, research, and community organizations to establish a shared vision that every child in California should have regular opportunities to learn outdoors. Activities included cross-sector convenings, research and evaluation coordination, and development of exemplars to support integration of outdoor learning into everyday schooling. Ten Strands, in partnership with Green Schoolyards America, is a founding partner of and continues to support the California Schoolyard Forest System, which seeks to ensure that all public school grounds achieve at least 30 percent tree canopy cover to protect students from extreme heat and the impacts of climate change. In addition, Ten Strands is a member of the statewide California School Garden Coalition and supports advocacy efforts to ensure that every school has a garden, further supporting equitable access to outdoor learning and environmental literacy. Found at:…
$472,584 spent15% of program spendingCalifornia Environmental Literacy Initiative (CAELI): For the tenth year, Ten Strands led and managed the California Environmental Literacy Initiative (CAELI), a statewide collective action network focused on advancing environmental literacy across Californias education system. During the fiscal year, Ten Strands supported network coordination, leadership development, and cross-sector collaboration among educators, administrators, and community partners to continue to implement recommendations from Californias 2015 Blueprint for Environmental Literacy. These efforts strengthened systems of support enabling students to engage in local, standards- and environment-based learning experiences statewide. CAELIs website can be found at: https://ca-eli.org/
$384,937 spent12% of program spending
The 4 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $3,129,098.
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 2021 to 2022, from $2.6M to $6.2M (+137%).
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: 2020 8% · 2022 1% · 2025 57%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
90% of Ten Strands’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (88% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 5 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
Karen Cowe
CEO
Board chair
William Parish
Chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 18 funders to 33 funders, grant income fell $3.6M → $1.4M.
19 of 67 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 45% 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 Ten Strands’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 67 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
Ten Strands has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 24% of grant income, and it takes 5 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 5 funders to its left
54% 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 Ten Strands.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 87% · 2018 56% · 2019 37% · 2020 30% · 2021 11% · 2022 22% · 2023 9% — 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 Ten Strands's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 76% 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
81% of Ten Strands's grant income comes from California funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $6.2M arriving through sponsors registered in 10 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
Ten Strands runs a healthier operating margin than half of the 1,209 environment nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,209 environment nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Organizations like Ten Strands
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 California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
83% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
87%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for Ten Strands: 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 Ten Strands?
- Ten Strands (California) receives grants from 67 organizations whose IRS filings report $13,808,326 to it, the largest being CALIFORNIA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ($3,251,050). 51 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Ten Strands have?
- IRS filings report 67 organizations giving $13,808,326 in grants to Ten Strands, 51 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Ten Strands?
- CALIFORNIA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $3,251,050 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Ten Strands find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. 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 Ten Strands →
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 67 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