Since its educational programming began in 1990, the National Inventors Hall of Fame (NIHF) has focused on inspiring emerging creators and entrepreneurs through in- and out-of-school education programs that combine hands-on fun and creativity with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) concepts. By crafting experiences based on real-world problem-solving through invention prototyping, NIHF encourages students to take risks while building their STEM confidence in an encouraging and supportive learning environment.
Overdeck Family Foundation began funding NIHF in 2020, a year when the pandemic brought many challenges to the education sector and nonprofit organizations nationwide. Because of its in-person delivery model, NIHF’s Camp Invention STEM summer camp program, designed for children in kindergarten through sixth grade, experienced significant declines in attendance. This decline stagnated the organization’s primary revenue stream, forcing it to quickly adapt and pivot to target ESSER public stimulus dollars, which could be used to support learning recovery efforts in out-of-school-time settings. Capitalizing on this influx of public dollars, NIHF established new contracts with school and district partners and redeveloped its flexible in- and out-of-school, at-home, and blended program, Invention Project, to allow districts to use federal stimulus dollars to secure its programming. Strong demand for Invention Project and the regrowth of Camp Invention grew programmatic revenue by double-digits and NIHF’s total reach from 236,000 to 392,000 kids in just two years.
In light of the influx of new, time-bound funding and the organization’s shift in programming, NIHF recognized a need to better understand its cost drivers and assess the long-term implications on its revenue model and financial plan. In addition to general operating support, Overdeck Family Foundation provided strategic capacity-building support to respond to these emerging needs:
- A cost-analysis exercise in 2021 to clarify the cost to deliver each program and outline a path to sustainability; and
- A refinement of the organization’s financial model in 2023 to effectively forecast unique financial scenarios and how the organization could respond to each one.
These capacity-building supports helped NIHF build a sophisticated understanding of its unit cost—informing the organization’s pricing sheet and sales structure going forward, as well as refining its strategic financial model to effectively prepare for a range of possible scenarios as a result of a tightening fiscal climate caused by the expiration of ESSER funds in September 2024.
Hannah Paulin, Chief Strategic Officer, said, “We have been able to get our 2024 budget in the model with all the variable drivers as well as ‘fixed’ expenses by department and account, so that we can independently adjust them to create a cohesive model, but have the ability to drill down when needed.” Based on the insights from the strategic financial planning process, the team clarified a set of goals including: growing revenue from the fee-based camp program model; exploring reliable and repeatable public funding streams (e.g. Title I-IV, 21st Century Community Learning Centers, Extended Learning Opportunity Program); and ensuring retention of philanthropic funders, where the team already has a strong track record.
As a result of pursuing these complementary capacity-building supports provided by Overdeck Family Foundation, NIHF has a strong financial infrastructure in place to prioritize sustainable programmatic strategies that will ensure as many children as possible have access to impactful, hands-on STEM education programs going forward.
