The Spacekind Foundation

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
273913174
IRS 990 coverage
2019–2025
Forms available
Form 990 2025, Form 990-EZ 2020, Form 990-N 2017
Location
Covina, CA, USA
Phone
9088678651
Rating
80
Verdict
STRONG
Rating confidence
Moderate
Sector
Commemorative Events

Official website

Reported finances

Revenue
$116,637
Expenses
$151,867
Assets
$97,812
Liabilities
$-268

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.

Leadership & pay

4 people listed

People named in this filing

  • Loretta Whitesides (Director)
  • Chris Lewicki (Board Member)
  • Rachel Lyons (Board Member)

Selected names, not a complete roster or a statement of current roles. Open leadership details for the complete filed list.

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.

Overview

Mission

Use the excitement and inspiration of space as a catalyst for educating and developing the next generation of explorers.

What it reported doing in 2025

AstroAccess: AstroAccess is a project dedicated to advancing disability inclusion in space exploration for the benefit of humankind.After a successful mission in 2021, a smaller group of AstroAccess Ambassadors flew with the Aurelia Institute in May 2022 as a part of a mixed-research payload flight. Two additional AstroAccess Ambassadors flew with another mixed-research flight campaign with Zero-G in November 2022. A second fully-dedicated parabolic flight was conducted from Houston, TX in December 2022. Ambassadors and volunteers prepared numerous experiments and demonstration tasks, rigorously applying lessons-learned from the previous flights. Collaborators included SciAccess, Inc., an international non-profit dedicated to advancing disability inclusion in STEM.

Operating model

Revenue model
Earned-program. 100% of the money available for current operations came from fees and other program 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

STRONG - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered and expenses are high relative to revenue.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 89
  • Transparency & Controls: 82
  • Accountability: 70
  • Sustainability: 20
  • Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 100%; rating input score 100
  • Program expense ratio: 100%; rating input score 100
  • Fundraising efficiency: Limited

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 90.9%; rating input score 91; 15th percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: Limited
  • 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; 64th percentile among comparable filings
  • Governance controls: 2 of 7 controls in place; rating input score 29
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Fail
    • Document-retention policy: Fail
    • CEO compensation review process: NotApplicable
    • Other executive compensation review process: NotApplicable
    • Form 990 shared with the board: Fail
    • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
    • Audit committee oversight: Missing
    • Independent financial-statement audit: Fail

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: -30.2%; rating input score 8; 8th percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.64; rating input score 30; 30th percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: Limited
  • Officer compensation ratio: 0%; rating input score 67; 67th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 2.2% per year; rating input score 100; 38th percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: 9.6% per year; rating input score 100; 68th percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 18.1% per year; rating input score 100; 80th percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • Where the money goes: 100% of revenue deployed · 100% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 3 of 3 board members independent · 2 of 7 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 3 filed program accomplishments · $152K in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $0 · 4 people listed
  • Consistency: 17 of 18 current checks pass · 1 finding to review
  • Schedules: 3 filed schedules
  • Filing history: 5 filing years from 2019 to 2025
  • Contacts: How to reach this organization
  • Money network: Resolved incoming and outgoing counterparties from filed money flows.
  • 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.

  • High — Accountability: Governance controls: 4 of 6 not reported.
  • High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 8/100.
  • Moderate — Transparency & Controls: Schedule A contributions reconciliation did not reconcile in the filed values.
  • Moderate — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 30/100.