Portable Practical Educational Preparation, Inc
Legal name: Portable Practical Educational Preparation Inc
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 237232227
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2009–2024
- Official website data refreshed
- Sep 2026
- Forms available
- Form 990 2024
- Location
- Tucson, AZ, USA
- Phone
- 520.622.3553
- Rating
- 77
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Human Service Organizations
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $88,091,215
- Expenses
- $88,965,888
- Assets
- $39,609,942
- Liabilities
- $17,204,990
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
11 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- MARIA CHAVEZ (VICE-PRESIDENT)
- PAUL DIAZ (PRESIDENT)
- JOHN ARNOLD (CEO)
Highest reported compensation
- JOHN ARNOLD (CEO): $371,907 total reported compensation
- BARBARA A CORONADO (COO): $171,671 total reported compensation
- KARI HOGAN (CAO): $166,409 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
To improve the quality of rural life.
What it reported doing in 2024
Employement and training: provide technical and job skills training and placing rural poor and farm workers into productive employment thru referrals, training, and direct placement.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Grant-funded. 99% of the money available for current operations came from government grants.
- 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. The filing reports few safeguards for money sent abroad and some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 84
- Transparency & Controls: 64
- Accountability: 91
- Sustainability: 29
- Growth: 100
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 95.3%; rating input score 95
- Program expense ratio: 94.2%; rating input score 94
- Fundraising efficiency: Limited
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 93.3%; rating input score 93; 21st percentile among comparable filings
- Pay-setting controls: 2 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 33
- Compensation committee: Missing
- Independent consultant: Missing
- Other Form 990s reviewed: Pass
- Written employment contract: Missing
- Compensation survey or study: Pass
- Board or committee approval: Missing
- Foreign activity oversight: 0 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 0
- Claims monitoring procedures: Fail
- Requires narrative reports: Fail
- Conducts field audits: Fail
- May suspend future funding: Fail
- Requires financial reports: Fail
- Conducts site visits: Fail
- Requires grant agreements: Fail
- May require repayment: Fail
- Grant itemization coverage: 98.7%; rating input score 99; 36th percentile among comparable filings
- Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
- Related-party transparency: Limited
Accountability
- Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 77th percentile among comparable filings
- Governance controls: 7 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 78
- 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: Fail
- Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
- Audit committee oversight: Fail
- Independent financial-statement audit: Pass
Sustainability
- Operating margin: -1%; rating input score 22; 22nd percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.45; rating input score 16; 16th percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.43; rating input score 42; 42nd percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 0.9%; rating input score 75; 75th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: 6.8% per year; rating input score 100; 56th percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: 5.3% per year; rating input score 100; 46th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 5.3% per year; rating input score 100; 39th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- What they do: 8 programs and campaigns described on the official site · 3 operating locations identified
- Where the money goes: 95.3% of revenue deployed · 94.2% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 7 of 7 board members independent · 7 of 9 filing controls reported
- Programs: 5 filed program accomplishments · $83.8M in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $372K · 11 people listed · 2 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
- Highest-paid contractors: 5 contractors listed · $58M reported
- Consistency: 32 of 33 current checks pass · 1 finding to review
- Schedules: 8 filed schedules · includes major donors, foreign activity, and executive pay
- Filing history: 16 filing years from 2009 to 2024
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 4 filed money-flow records
- Related organizations: 1 filed related-organization link
- 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.
- High — Transparency & Controls: Foreign activity oversight: 8 of 8 not reported.
- Review — Accountability: Governance controls: 2 of 9 not reported.
- High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 22/100.
- High — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 16/100.
- Moderate — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 42/100.
- Review — Transparency & Controls: Foreign grant itemization did not reconcile in the filed values.
- High — Grant Readiness: Federal audit findings: this organization reported findings in its latest federal Single Audit.