Moving Forward Institute
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 271438527
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2020–2024
- Forms available
- Form 990 2024, Form 990-N 2014
- Location
- Emeryville, CA, USA
- Phone
- 5103878101
- Rating
- 79
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Youth Development Programs
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $1,184,703
- Expenses
- $1,138,396
- Assets
- $770,248
- Liabilities
- $0
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
2 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- D Lacy Asbill (CEO, CFO)
Highest reported compensation
- D Lacy Asbill (CEO, CFO): $168,600 total reported compensation
- Elana Metz (Secretary): $168,600 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
Moving Forward Institute focuses on students' emotional well-being as a critical strategy for improving their academic achievement. MFI draws together culturally-relevant literacy instruction and social/emotional learning to inspire young people to engage with reading, accelerate their academic achievement, and develop life-changing social and emotional skills.
What it reported doing in 2024
During 2024, Moving Forward Institute published four new units of its Reading with Relevance curricula. Each unit provides a classroom teacher, intervention specialist, or volunteer with a comprehensive set of lesson plans to explore a single high-interest, culturally-relevant novel, including all of the tools, resources, and activities necessary to help students make meaning of what they've read. As of 2024, thousands of schools across the United States utilize these Reading with Relevance materials in their classrooms.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Other-operating. 100% of the money available for current operations came from other operating revenue.
- Distribution model
- Direct operator. The filing allocates 100% of reported program-service expenses outside its grant, affiliate-payment, and member-benefit lines. This expense classification does not rule out separately announced grant awards.
The verdict
SUPPORTED - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Expenses are high relative to revenue and total assets are small relative to annual expenses; liquid coverage is unknown.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 83
- Transparency & Controls: 66
- Accountability: 95
- Sustainability: 43
- Growth: 100
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 91.9%; rating input score 92
- Program expense ratio: 95.6%; rating input score 96
- Fundraising efficiency: Limited
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
- Pay-setting controls: 1 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 17
- Compensation committee: Missing
- Independent consultant: Missing
- Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
- Written employment contract: Missing
- Compensation survey or study: Pass
- Board or committee approval: Missing
- Foreign activity oversight: Limited
- Grant itemization coverage: Limited
- Major donor itemization: Limited
- Related-party transparency: Limited
Accountability
- Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
- Governance controls: 8 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 89
- Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
- Whistleblower policy: Pass
- Document-retention policy: Pass
- CEO compensation review process: Pass
- Other executive compensation review process: Pass
- Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
- Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
- Audit committee oversight: Pass
- Independent financial-statement audit: Fail
Sustainability
- Operating margin: 3.9%; rating input score 47; 47th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.68; rating input score 31; 31st percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0; rating input score 91; 91st percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 29.6%; rating input score 7; 7th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: 31.2% per year; rating input score 100; 91st percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: 23% per year; rating input score 100; 88th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 28.1% per year; rating input score 100; 89th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- Where the money goes: 91.9% of revenue deployed · 95.6% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 4 of 4 board members independent · 8 of 9 filing controls reported
- Programs: 3 filed program accomplishments · $1.1M in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $169K · 2 people listed · 1 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
- Consistency: 39 of 39 current checks pass
- Schedules: 3 filed schedules · includes executive pay
- Filing history: 5 filing years from 2020 to 2024
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 2 filed money-flow records
- Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
- People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.
Key Signals
Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.
Grant-readiness screening is separate from the live rating, not a measure of program quality. Review the source records before making a grant decision.
- Moderate — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 47/100.
- Moderate — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 31/100.
- Review — Accountability: Governance controls: Independent financial-statement audit not reported.
- High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 7/100.
- Review — Grant Readiness: California registration: this organization could not be resolved against the register, so the check is unfinished.