Indspire

About Indspire:

Founded in 1985, Indspire helps Indigenous students in Canada complete their post-secondary education. Indigenous people are under-represented in post-secondary education, with only 10% of Indigenous students completing university degrees compared to 32% of other Canadian students. A big part of this gap is due to a lack of funding. The charity’s head office is in Ohsweken, Ontario.

A Charity Intelligence 2018 Top 10 Canadian Impact Charity

Building Brighter Futures (BBF) is Indspire’s largest program, representing 66% of program costs in F2017. Through BBF, Indspire grants bursaries, scholarships and awards to Indigenous students who need financial aid to complete their post-secondary education. BBF funded 3,764 students in F2017, disbursing $11.6 million. Building Brighter Futures represents the largest scholarship and bursary program for Indigenous students in Canada aside from the Government of Canada. The two most popular areas of study for students receiving funding were education and nursing.

The K-12 Indspire Institute connects educators with programs, resources and tools to improve the educational outcomes of Indigenous students. There are more than 1000 educational tools online for teachers, students and parents of the Indigenous community. K-12 Indspire Institute costs made up 18% of program costs in F2017. The charity also holds an annual National Gathering for educators and partners from across Canada to share experiences and strategies for educating Indigenous students.

Indspire runs two education mentorship programs for Indigenous students; Rivers to Success and Peer Support. In F2017, education represented 12% of program costs. Rivers to Success is a national mentorship program for Indigenous students with two streams. The post-secondary stream matches Indigenous students with career professionals. The high school stream, which is new in F2017, connects high school students with post-secondary students to encourage successful high school completions. Peer Support is a mentorship and coaching program for educators of Indigenous students. It connects teachers based on subjects they teach and offers online support through webinars.

Soaring is Indspire's Indigenous Youth Career Conference program, which educates high school students about possible career and post-secondary education options. The conferences made up 4% of program costs in F2017.

Results and Impact: Charity Intelligence has rated Indspire as Good impact per dollar (see grid bottom right). The charity reports that in 2017, 96% of students who were supported by Indspire’s BBF graduated. 42% of survey respondents obtained employment and 53% pursued higher education. This is an improvement over the 93% of students who graduated in 2016. In 2017, the charity reports to have 800 attendees at the National Gathering for Indigenous Education that took place in Toronto. Indspire states to have 240 participants in its Peer Support program.

Financial Review:

Indspire is a Large charity with total donations and goods-in-kind revenues of $8.4m in F2017. Administrative costs are 11% of revenues and fundraising costs are 14% of donations, excluding goods-in-kind. For every dollar donated, $0.75 goes towards Indspire’s programs, falling within Ci's reasonable range for overhead spending. The charity holds funding reserves of $29.2m, of which $25.4m are donor-endowed. Excluding donor-endowed funds, Indspire’s funding reserves can only cover 3 months of program costs, indicating a need for donations.

Indspire reports using external fundraisers as part of its fundraising activities. In F2017, Indspire paid external fundraisers $15k that raised $30k. For every dollar Indspire raised from external fundraisers, it paid $0.51 to the third party.

This charity report is an update that has been sent to Indspire for review. Changes and edits may be forthcoming.

Updated on June 11, 2018 by Derek Houlberg.