California · Nonprofit
Vocal Justice
Vocal Justice (California) receives grants from 20 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,483,584 to it, the largest being CHICAGO BEYOND INC ($300,000). 9 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $723k
- Funders on record
- 20
- Grants received
- $1.5M
- Net assets
- $201k
What Vocal Justice does
Mission
We inspire and prepare middle and high school students to be social change leaders. We do this by providing teachers with curriculum and training to transform their classes into places that help students develop and use their voices for change.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
Our programs empower educators and youth to lead social change through storytelling, collaboration, and community engagement. The Teacher Fellowship supports middle and high school teachers with a yearlong storytelling curriculum that enhances students self and social awareness and communication skills. Teacher fellows receive compensation and provide valuable feedback to refine the program. The Youth Power Collective trains and pays high school students to design and implement social change projects in their communities, with teacher mentors also compensated for their support and feedback. The Youth Advisory Council engages high school and college students as paid advisors who help shape our nonprofits programming and operations while gaining professional development and networking opportunities to grow as emerging social change leaders.
$354,816 spent$3,430 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $354,816.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2023, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2023, 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 $41k to $227k (+459%).
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.
97% of Vocal Justice’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. 1 of the last 3 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
Shawon Jackson
Executive Director / Treasurer
Board chair
Stephanie Ng
Chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2022 → 2023: the base broadened from 1 funder to 15 funders, grant income rose $13k → $873k.
6 of 20 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 35% 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 Vocal Justice’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
Vocal Justice has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 20% 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
53% 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 Vocal Justice.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2022 100% · 2023 34% — 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.
Where its funders are
Vocal Justice draws 84% of its grant income from funders outside California, across 7 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $523k arriving through sponsors registered in 6 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
Vocal Justice has grown faster than three-quarters of the 17,450 education nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 17,450 education nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2025
Organizations like Vocal Justice
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
48% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
0%
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 Vocal Justice: 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 Vocal Justice?
- Vocal Justice (California) receives grants from 20 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,483,584 to it, the largest being CHICAGO BEYOND INC ($300,000). 9 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Vocal Justice have?
- IRS filings report 20 organizations giving $1,483,584 in grants to Vocal Justice, 9 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Vocal Justice?
- CHICAGO BEYOND INC is the largest funder on record, with $300,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Vocal Justice 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 Vocal Justice →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2023–2025), and the filings of 20 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