The Boundless School

About The Boundless School:

The Boundless School was founded in 1984 as an outdoor adventure centre, and became a charity in 1989. Its mission is "to have our students return home feeling like champions; accomplished, selfless and with a new way of seeing things." The Boundless School aims to improve the lives of a diverse group of at-risk youth from Toronto's public school system. Youths may have severe mental illnesses, addictions or acquired brain injuries, preventing them from engaging in mainstream education. The Boundless School strives to help youth return to high school and graduate.

The Boundless School's boarding school program offers 20, 40 and 50-day sessions to teens aged 15 to 19. Students have an opportunity to earn high school credits for Math, English, History and elective courses. In F2016, the Boundless Live-In School (BLISS) served 72 students, with 66 students completing the program. Further, BLISS issued 279 of 292 possible credits. BLISS students' grades improved by over 24% in English, Math and History courses.

The Boundless School also offers 5-day adventure programs in partnership with several Ontario-based community agencies. The programs can allow students to earn high school credits. In F2016, the group program served 132 students, with 129 youths successfully completing the program. The program issued 129 out of 132 possible credits.

Charity Intelligence has researched Boundless School since 2009. Boundless is a consistently high-rated charity with high charity impact, particularly for donors looking to help at-risk kids graduate from high school. Boundless was included in Ci's 2015 Canadian Charity Impact fund as a top 10 impact charity.

Financial Review:

The Boundless School is a small-cap charity, with donations of $625k in F2016. Its financial statements and CRA filings do not explicitly disclose the fundraising and administrative costs. Ci has calculated administrative costs at 4% of revenues in F2016, although this number is likely understated given the lack of disclosure. Boundless has reported that its auditor has approved a fundraising cost of $28k, or 4% of donations. For every $1 donated to Boundless, 92 cents is put towards its programs. This falls within Ci's reasonable range for overhead costs. Its funding reserves of $2.6m result in a program cost coverage ratio of 160%. This means Boundless can fund its program costs for 1.6 years.

This charity report is an update that is being reviewed by The Boundless School. Changes and edits may be forthcoming.

Updated on May 10, 2017 by Josh Lam.