Children's Museum of Atlanta

What it reported doing in 2024

Children's museum of atlanta (cma) operates as an institution of informal learning for young children, their parents, caregivers, and teachers. Through interactive exhibits, programs, workshops, and extensive outreach. The museum offers opportunities to address subjects and issues that are important and relevant to schools, families, and the community. The total number of museum visitors and children who have visited the museum has surpassed 3,500,000 since opening in 2003. The exhibits and programs below were presented throughout the fiscal year 2024-25. Virtual programming continued to ensure access and equity to cma programs. The museum changed in-person requirements to align with the center for disease control's guidance and provide guests access to in-person programming.exhibits & programming: presented the following feature exhibits: animationland, may 18, 2024 september 8, 2024: guests were invited on a fantastical journey to create stories using art and science, channeling their creativity using animation basics such as storyboarding, sketching, stop-motion movie making, and more. Children engaged in interactive activities, including creating 14-frame animations, experimenting with frame rates and movement concepts, and using the foley booth to add sounds to animated clips. Wallace & gromit: get cracking!, september 21, 2024 january 12, 2025: this interactive exhibit invited children to step into the north england home of cheese-loving inventor wallace and his loyal dog, gromit. Designed for children ages 3 through 9, the activities included launching porridge from a cannon, fixing the broken autochef, creating their own cracking contraptions, blasting off in wallace's rocket to the moon, and hopping into preston's truck. The exhibit built on problem-solving themes while encouraging children to solve stem-based and social-emotional problems playfully. Xoxo: an exhibit about love & forgiveness, january 25, 2025 may 4, 2025: this exhibit provided children and caregivers the opportunity to explore feelings through activities designed to help them understand and express their emotions. Children engaged in interactive activities such as illuminating hidden messages about love, answering questions at the response wall, creating silhouettes using light boxes, building facial expressions using empathy blocks, and releasing negative feelings through a paper shredder. The exhibit helped children understand and manage their emotions while fostering empathy and enhancing emotional intelligence.scooby-doo! Mansion mayhem, may 17, 2025 september 7, 2025: this immersive experience allowed families to join mystery inc. To analyze clues and put their problem-solving skills to the test. Children worked through the mansion rooms, meeting different characters from the iconic tv show. Activities included discovering the villain's hidden control panel in the hall of portraits, building traps with fred in the villain's tinkering workshop, participating in ghost chases with shaggy and scooby-doo in the kitchen, and solving musical puzzles with velma in the library music room.ongoing partnerships - with community leaders, artists, experts, and cultural institutions enable us to provide innovative and relevant exhibits and programs that address a full range of topics and issues. Over 200 individuals from our community participate on a variety of committees each year, which ensures depth, accuracy and targeted messages and focus.cma presents science, health, literacy, diversity, arts, social studies, and safety programs through: -innovation station - ongoing hands-on stem based experiences with an emphasis on the engineering design process -science bar - ongoing hands-on exploration of science experiments and experiences facilitated by staff scientist -multi-cultural holiday programming throughout the year to highlight the many cultures that call atlanta home. -black history month celebrations -explore the museum program for children on the auti

Financial Efficiency

• Mission deployment rate: 94.7%; rating input score 95
• Program expense ratio: 81.6%; rating input score 82
• Fundraising efficiency: $2.48 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 7; 7th percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

• Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd 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: Missing
  • Written employment contract: Missing
  • Compensation survey or study: Pass
  • Board or committee approval: Pass
• Foreign activity oversight: Limited
• Grant itemization coverage: Limited
• Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
• 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: Fail
  • 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: Pass

Sustainability

• Operating margin: -13.8%; rating input score 10; 10th percentile among comparable filings
• Total-asset coverage ratio: 1.95; rating input score 61; 61st percentile among comparable filings
• Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.4; rating input score 27; 27th percentile among comparable filings
• Officer compensation ratio: 6.4%; rating input score 44; 44th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

• Program expense growth: 3.6% per year; rating input score 100; 31st percentile among comparable filings
• Revenue growth: -0.8% per year; rating input score 0; 9th percentile among comparable filings
• Asset growth: 0.5% per year; rating input score 100; 14th percentile among comparable filings