Discovery House is a 5-star rated charity with an A+ grade in results reporting. The charity has best practices in financial transparency and relatively low overhead costs.

Founded in 1980, Discovery House helps women and children escape domestic violence and live safely in Calgary. The charity reports that 65% of women at Discovery House have experienced physical abuse. Further, 75% of women at Discovery House reported emotional, psychological, or verbal abuse. Discovery House provides housing for women and children escaping domestic abuse. It mainly acts as a second-stage shelter, providing a transition between short-term emergency shelters and long-term independent housing. Discovery House uses a "housing first" model, prioritizing finding stable housing for families. Discovery House provides families additional services and support after safely being housed. The charity states that it assigns each family a case manager, a youth case manager, a mental health clinician, and a housing liaison.

Discovery House operates four main programs: Shelter, Community Housing, Mental Health, and Child and Youth supports.

Discovery House's Shelter program accounted for 36% ($1.5m) of program spending in F2022. In F2022, the charity's 19-unit shelter served 115 people. The charity reports that of the women who completed its intake assessment, 74% were at increased, severe, or extreme risk of being killed by an abusive partner at intake. Discovery House reports that the average stay in the shelter was ten months in F2022.

The charity's Community Housing program made up 31% of program spending ($1.3m). Discovery House reports that it served 100 families in F2022, 70% of which came from racially marginalized backgrounds. The charity helps clients find safe and affordable housing, provides case management, subsidies, and landlord supports. In F2022, the charity helped 146 families through the Community Housing Program.

Mental Health programs accounted for 15% ($627k) of program spending in F2022. Discovery House provides one-on-one counselling for mothers and children, designed to understand the impacts of domestic violence, increase self-esteem, improve communication skills, and address the experience of trauma. The charity served 164 clients, 53 of which were children and youth in F2022. Discovery House provided 3,893 client support hours through one-on-one counselling, group support, resource referrals, and connections to the community.

Child and Youth programs made up 15% ($600k) of Discovery House's program spending in F2022. Through this program, the charity works with parents and children to mitigate the effects of trauma on brain development and strengthen parenting skills. The charity provides access to one-on-one counselling and case management for children and youth. Additionally, 12 mothers completed the charity's Parenting After Violence program.

The charity's Outreach and Bursary program made up the remaining 3% ($121k) of program spending in F2022. In F2022, the charity gave scholarships and bursaries to three different women for a total of $40k.

Discovery House received $3.2m in donations and special events revenue in F2022. It received $1.4m in government funding, representing 28% of total revenues. Administrative costs are 5% of revenues (less investment income), and fundraising costs are 12% of donations and special events revenue. For every dollar donated to the charity, 83 cents go to the cause. This falls within Ci’s reasonable range for overhead spending.

Discovery House has $4.8m in funding reserves, of which $1.0m is donor-endowed. Excluding donor-endowed funds, Discovery House could cover just under 11 months of annual program costs.

Updated on July 5, 2022 by Ann Lei.