The NEA Foundation for the Improvement of Education
Keeping the Promise of Public Education
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
A dynamic public education system is more important than ever—students from all backgrounds rely on it to prepare themselves for college, career, and beyond. According to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), more than 50 million students today attend public elementary and secondary schools in America. • Since 1969, the year the NEA Foundation was founded, more than 130 million students have earned diplomas at public high schools. • In 2019 NCES estimates that more than 3.2 million students will graduate from all US high schools with 93% graduating from public high schools. No single group of public or private service professionals makes a greater impact, every day, on more American lives than do our nation’s public school educators. That’s why for the past 50 years the Foundation has served as a laboratory of learning, offering funding and other resources to public school educators, their schools, and districts to solve complex teaching and learning challenges. T
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Grants to Educators
To improve student learning, we provide grants to individual and teams of educators to support instructional practice and professional development across all subject areas and grade levels. By directly funding educator-conceived and led projects, the Foundation enables educators to chart their own course to solve teaching and learning challenges. The Foundation gleans knowledge from these grants to share what works with the field and to inform our broader body of work. Since 2012, we have awarded more than $2.4 million in grants, reaching more than 35,000 educators and 512,000 students in 49 states.
Educators can apply for Student Achievement Grants, which provide opportunities to improve
student achievement in any subject area. We also offer Learning & Leadership Grants, which
support high-quality professional development that is shared with colleagues.
Salute to Excellence in Education Gala
We present the Awards for Teaching Excellence at our annual gala to honor the critical work that public school educators do every day. Selected from the NEA state associations’ nominees, the Foundation names five national finalists who receive $10,000 and a winner who receives an additional $25,000. In 2019, we celebrated 46 exemplary educators, all from different states, in front of an audience of 3,000 people in Washington, DC and online.
STEM
The NEA Foundation invests in educator-led and union-supported STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) programming that encourages students to incorporate STEM learning in their daily lives, academic careers, and professional endeavors. We believe that hands-on learning is key to sparking and maintaining interest in these fields. Since 2017, the Foundation has awarded grants to increase student engagement and motivation around STEM in Hamilton County, TN, Greeley, CO. In Fall 2019, the Foundation announced second round STEM sites in Moreno Valley, CA and Green Bay, WI. These sites will share best practices in hands-on learning to inform educators in other communities.
Global Learning Fellowship
We believe that in order for students to prepare for life on a global scale, the educator must first be equipped with the knowledge, skills, and experiences needed to teach in the global age. The annual Global Learning Fellowship program is designed to broaden educators’ and students’ perspectives through cohort-based professional development to provide educators with a blend of online, peer, and field-based learning opportunities to prepare themselves and their students for global citizenship. Fellows share what they learn with educators around the country and world by posting free, adaptable, globally-focused lesson plans online. More than 130 global learning lesson plans are now available, and we are cultivating a growing network of global education leaders and advocates. 12 lesson plans developed and tested by the 2018 Global Learning Fellowship cohort have been published as an ebook and hard copy text.
Where we work
Affiliations & memberships
Independent Charities of America 2014
External reviews

Videos
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
The NEA Foundation's mission is to improve public education for all students. We offer funding and other resources to public school educators, their schools, and their districts to solve complex teaching and learning challenges to prepare each of America's children to learn and thrive in a rapidly changing world.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
We award Grants to Educators, supporting classroom projects that enhance teaching and learning, or offsetting the cost of professional development for educators. We lead a professional development, cohort-based program annually, called the Global Learning Fellowship, for NEA member educators who want to deepen their global competence and explore how to apply it to classroom instruction. In addition, we seek to bring high-quality, project-based STEM instruction to high-need districts and extract knowledge proof points about how best to engage educators in the design and implementation of such initiatives.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Bringing with her over twenty years of leadership experience in the education and philanthropic sectors, Sara A. Sneed joined the NEA Foundation as President and CEO in early 2019. She and the NEA Foundation senior leadership team possess the deep knowledge and skills needed to advance the Foundation’s strategic priorities through grant-making, technical assistance, program evaluation, and knowledge dissemination.
These programs include our Global Learning Fellowship, designed to develop educators’ knowledge and skills in order to integrate global competency into their classroom instruction, advocate for global competency in their schools and districts, and help students thrive in an increasingly interconnected world. Through our STEM initiative, we award multi-year grants for programs that increase access to and improve the quality of STEM education in underserved communities. Finally, through our Grants to Educators program, we directly fund educator conceived and led projects to enhance improve classroom instruction or for professional development. Our external panel of grant reviewers is comprised of educators, subject matter experts, and other members of the education community.
From incorporating educator expertise into our program design and implementation and decision- making through educator representation on our Board of Directors, to our interaction with educators who are the beneficiary of our grants and Fellowships in regard to their applications and reporting requirements, the NEA Foundation staff are accustomed to working with educators from diverse backgrounds.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
During the NEA Foundation’s past fiscal year, our programs served nearly 6,000 educators and 117,000 students, and made advancements in programs including:
STEM: The Foundation’s investments are designated to under-resourced school districts to improve access to comprehensive, project-based STEM curriculum to both engage and encourage students to incorporate STEM learnings into their daily lives and academic careers. First round grants were previously awarded in Greeley, CO and Hamilton County, TN. Second round grants are set to be announced in Fall 2019.
Grants to Educators: 109 grants have been awarded reaching close to 108,000 students and nearly 6,000 educators. 34 grantees posted their lesson plans on an open source forum available to educators nationwide.
Global Learning Fellows: The Foundation’s 2019 class of Fellows was comprised of 46 educators from across the country and impacted nearly 9,500 students. In 2018 the Foundation, was proud to have published its first book, 12 Lessons to Open Classrooms and Minds to the World, of which to-date nearly 200 have been purchased. The lesson plans in the book were devised and tested by the 2018 cohort of Global Learning Fellows. It is available in both e-reader and hard copy formats and is accessible on Amazon.com. The 2020 cohort of Fellows is comprised of 44 public school educators from across the nation.
The Foundation continues to refine its metrics and to identify opportunities to share programmatic learnings more broadly.
Financials
Unlock nonprofit financial insights that will help you make more informed decisions. Try our monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights?
Learn more
about GuideStar Pro.
Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
The NEA Foundation for the Improvement of Education
Board of directorsas of 01/21/2022
Valeria Lassiter
Lassiter & Associates
Sara Sneed
The NEA Foundation
Bertis Downs
Entertainment Lawyer and Advisor
Daaiyah Bilal-Threats
National Education Association
Laura Engel
The George Washington University
Joanne Krell
Defy Communications
Kevin Anderson
Valeria Lassiter
Lassiter and Associates, LLC
Nick Archuleta
North Dakota United
Stacey Herndon
PNC Institutional Investments
Monica Washington
BetterLesson
Joy Whitlow
Aaro Bell
Bret Conklin
Horace Mann
Oleta Fitzgerald
Children's Defense Fund
Brent McKim
National Council of Urban Education Associations
Pedro Noguera
USC Rossier School of Education
Jane Quinn
Jerome Paige, Ph.D.
Roger Pollak
Bredhof & Kaiser
Becky Pringle
National Education Association
Marcy Singer-Gabella
Vanderbilt University
Tammy Smith
Jerry Weast
Ross Wiener
Aspen Institute
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
-
Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? Yes -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Yes -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes -
Board performance
Has the board conducted a formal, written self-assessment of its performance within the past three years? Yes
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? GuideStar partnered on this section with CHANGE Philanthropy and Equity in the Center.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
No data
Gender identity
No data
No data
Sexual orientation
No data
Disability
No data