San Diego Science Alliance
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 330806707
- IRS 990-EZ coverage
- 2014–2015
- Forms available
- Form 990-EZ 2015
- Location
- Encinitas, CA, USA
- Phone
- 6194009777
- Rating
- 82
- Verdict
- STRONG
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Alliance/Advocacy
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $81,076
- Expenses
- $178,348
- Assets
- $0
Source: IRS Form 990-EZ. Selected filing: tax year 2015. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
18 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- Cindy Hesse (President)
- Teresa Sanchez (Vice President)
People named in this filing
- Cindy Hesse (President)
- Ellen Peneski (Executive Dir.)
- Orianna Bretschger (Director)
Selected names, not a complete roster or a statement of current roles. Open leadership details for the complete filed list.
Source: IRS Form 990-EZ. Selected filing: tax year 2015. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
As San Diegos leading force for STEM advancement, the San Diego Science Alliance (SDSA) puts our expertise and resources into action to ignite passion and strengthen the education-industry pipeline so that we can re-emerge as a global leader in STEM. Now in its 18th year, SDSA continues to remove obstacles to STEM preparedness by incubating collaborative ventures and delivering programs and services that connect the regions 500,000 K-12 students, 20,000+ STEM teachers and numerous STEM professionals, research and university partners. Five major activities which serve to accomplish these goals include: BE WiSE, High Tech Fair, Exploring STEM Careers, Robotics, Health Science Initiative, and the San Diego STEM Collaboratory. These activities are described further in Part III Line 4a.
What it reported doing in 2015
BE WISE (2014)BE WISE engages girls in science and engineering from middle through high schools with professional women. During FY2014 school year, BE WISE hosted 3 overnights, 25 Saturday workshops and 2 summer week long academies to reach 120 new girls and 550 active alumnae, representing 70 schools in San Diego County. These activities were organized by 31 members of a steering committee and involved 26 scientist volunteers who contributed a total of approximately 2500 hours.High Tech Fair (2014)High Tech Fair presents a two-day exposition for middle and high-school students, teachers and families featuring STEM innovators across San Diego County. In 2014, we hosted 66 STEM exhibiting companies, non-profits and educational institutions staffed by 250 innovators. Over 4200 people attended the combine Student/Parent night and full School Day fair. Exhibitors were organized into strands featuring Aerospace and Engineering, Biotech, Energy and CleanTech, Conservation and Environment, HealthTech, InfoTech, and Robotics.Exploring STEM Careers: RoboticsExploring STEM Careers Initiative (ESCI) is a National Science Foundation funded collaborative partnership led by the San Diego Science Alliance, a non-profit organization, and San Diego State University Research Foundation. The collaborative includes 6th -12th grade school districts and school sites, STEM industries, and institutes of higher education. Over the past three years ESCI has supported close to 100 teachers and nearly 1400 students from over 50 schools in 11 San Diego County districts. STEM challenge activities supported by ESCi are: Botball A team-oriented robotics competition where students pit their robots head-to-head in a fast paced, non-destructive regional tournament. http://www.botball.org/SeaPerch Students construct and wire remotely controlled underwater vehicles and use them in research events to learn about and understand environmental issues as novice scientists. http://www.seaperch.org/indexKid Wind Students are immersed in the science and construction of wind turbines and then explore how to maximize output through the process of design and redesign. http://learn.kidwind.org/Health Science Initiative (2014)The Health Sciences Initiative (HSI) is a collaborative effort between SDSA, the health-care industry and education organizations to encourage students to study health science in high school. HSI serves to support and expand 15 Health Career Academy programs by connecting students to 'real world' health career opportunities through programs and partnerships with local service providers and policy makers.San Diego STEM CollaboratorySDSA serves as a regional partner of the California STEM Learning Network through the San Diego STEM Collaboratory. This collaborative partnership invites stakeholders to come together to find ways to fuel our innovation economy with STEM talent developed in our local K-16 pipeline. The San Diego STEm Collaboratory has launched phase one development of a Quality STEm Criteria for schools and programs and hosted the inaugural San Diego STEM Summit attended by over 150 participants, 42 academic, industry, and nonprofit organizations and 19 school districts. A Criteria for Quality STEM/STEAM in San Diego has been published under this umbrella.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Cannot be determined from the filing. The filing does not provide enough consistent revenue detail to tell how this nonprofit funds its work.
- 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
STRONG - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Expenses are high relative to revenue and program spending has declined or grown slowly.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 98
- Transparency & Controls: 82
- Sustainability: 4
- Growth: 0
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 100%; rating input score 100
- Program expense ratio: 96.4%; rating input score 96
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 51st percentile among comparable filings
- Major donor itemization: Limited
Sustainability
- Operating margin: -120%; rating input score 6; 6th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 0; rating input score 1; 1st percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: Limited
- Officer compensation ratio: 16.8%; rating input score 9; 9th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: -1.4% per year; rating input score 0; 46th percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: -83.4% per year; rating input score 0; 3rd percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: -200% per year; rating input score 0; 0th percentile among comparable filings
Details
- Where the money goes: 100% of revenue deployed · 96.4% of spending went to programs
- Governance: Filed governance answers
- Accomplishments: 1 filed program accomplishment · $172K in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $0 · 18 people listed
- Consistency: 5 of 5 current checks pass
- Schedules: 3 filed schedules
- Filing history: 2 filing years from 2014 to 2015
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 1 filed money-flow record
- 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 — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 6/100.
- High — Growth: Program expense growth scored 0/100.
- High — Growth: Revenue growth scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 1/100.
- High — Growth: Asset growth scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 9/100.
- High — Grant Readiness: California registration: this organization is recorded as not currently operating in California.