Grantees
Most of Margulf's grantees fall into two grantmaking areas, learning environments and talent.
Learning Environments grantees are creating educational spaces that help youth thrive academically, socially, emotionally, and physically.
Talent grantees support the people, community, and conditions necessary to surround youth with engaging and meaningful learning experiences.
4.0
Nicole Jarbo
CEO
4.0 is a "first check" investor in promising leaders to pilot tomorrow’s learning models, by connecting, coaching, and funding 100+ aspiring founders every year to build a more equitable future of school with youth and families in their local communities.
African Leadership Group
Papa Dia
Founder & Executive Director
African Leadership Group connects cultures, develops strong community leaders, and - within their education focus area - advocates for improved public school systems and accountability, greater pathways to higher education, and leadership development.
Bellwether Education
Hailly T.N. Korman
Senior Associate Partner for Policy and Evaluation
Bellwether Education transforms education to ensure systematically marginalized young people achieve outcomes that lead to fulfilling lives and flourishing communities. Margulf's partnership with Bellwether focuses on the intersection among schools, high-quality education, and youth in institutional settings.
Bilingual Generation
Veronica Benavides
Founder
Bilingual Generation works to empower families and educators with the tools to help youth maintain a meaningful connection with their heritage languages through culturally-affirming programs, curricula, and resources that celebrate multilingualism.
Boys and Girls Clubs of the San Luis Valley
Aaron Miltenberger
Chief Executive Officer and President
BGCSLV provides young people in rural Colorado with opportunities to achieve academic success, build healthy life-long habits, and foster the skills they need to be active in their communities.
Branch Alliance for Educator Diversity
Cassandra Herring
Founder, President, and Chief Executive Officer
BranchED is dedicated to strengthening, growing, and amplifying the impact of educator preparation at Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), with the longer-range goals of both diversifying the teaching profession and intentionally addressing critical issues of educational equity for all students.
Camelback Ventures
Shawna Young
Chief Executive Officer
Camelback Ventures is a start-up accelerator that identifies, develops, and promotes early-stage entrepreneurs.
Collaborative Healing Initiative Within Communities
Sadé Cooper
Executive Director
CHIC builds women's economic, social, and cultural capital by providing in-school enrichment programs for youth and workforce opportunities for women and families.
Colorado Education Initiative
Rebecca Holmes
President and Chief Executive Officer
CEI invests time, expertise, and dollars into redesigning K-12 public education at scale in partnership with districts and schools.
Colorado Youth Congress
Jason Romero
Executive Director
CYC trains diverse communities of young people to lead systems change by bringing together high school students from urban, suburban and rural communities across Colorado — from all racial, socioeconomic and political backgrounds — to build a community and learn what it takes to lead change in a complex world.
Compass Academy
Brandon Jones
Executive Director
Compass Academy is a charter school in southwest Denver that currently serves 6th, 7th, and 8th graders and supports students in developing integrated academic and social- emotional competencies that provide pathways from poverty to post-secondary success.
Convivir
Tania Chairez
Founder and Executive Director
Convivir Colorado is a year-round program that partners with schools to encourage student ownership over their migrant experience by giving multi-generational immigrant and refugee students the opportuntity to engage with mentors and participate in workshops that develop their sense of self and build power among their peers.
Creativity Challenge Community School at Denver Public Schools
Brent Applebaum
Principal
C3 provides a 21st Century education for a diverse population of elementary age students in Southeast Denver that believes in the importance of thinking creatively to solve problems, learning collaboratively through partnerships with community organizations and challenging each other to their highest potential.
Cultivando
Olga Gonzalez
Executive Director
Cultivando centers its work on community leadership to advance health equity through advocacy, collaboration, and policy change. Their Friends, Families, and Neighbors (FFN) program trains and supports hundreds of Spanish-speaking childcare providers on early childhood education, early literacy, health, and kindergarten readiness.
Ednium: The Alumni Collective
TeRay Esquibel
Executive Director
Ednium is an action focused community development organization that partners with public school alumni (30 & under) to change the way cities educate and reinvest in their homegrown talent.
Education Leaders of Color
Sharhonda Bossier
Chief Executive Officer
EdLoC is a membership organization dedicated to elevating the leadership, voices and influence of people of color in education and to leading more inclusive efforts to improve education.
Embark Education
Jill Fricker
Executive Director
Embark Education is a middle school (grades 6-8) in northwest Denver that serves as a launchpad for students’ inherent intellectual curiosity by grounding academics in real world situations.
Formation Ventures
Saamra Mekuria-Grillo
Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Formation Ventures closes the wealth gap by building a thriving ecosystem of Black entrepreneurs, through learning, support, and funding, starting in high school.
Franklin Street Studio
Britt Erickson
Founder and Principal
Franklin Street Studio designs immersive learning experiences to support creativity, collaboration, and impact in education.
Green Schools National Network
Jennifer Seydel
Executive Director
GSNN works across the country to transform schools so that they can prepare today’s students to be tomorrow’s sustainability leaders.
GripTape
Mark Murphy
Founder and Chief Executive Officer
GripTape offers radically different learning experiences for young people across the world and ensures they have the resources, respect, and authority to pursue their own learning passions.
HadaNõu Collective
Nathan Pai Schmitt
Executive Director
HNC works with community-focused education leaders to increase their organizations' impact through an intensive and powerful support infrastructure.
ImmSchools
Viridiana Carrizales
Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer
ImmSchools is an immigrant-led nonprofit partnering with educators and community leaders to ensure safe and inclusive schools for undocumented and mixed status students and families.
Indigenous Montessori Institute at the Keres Children's Learning Center
Trisha Moquino and Povi Mithcell
Co-Directors
The Indigenous Montessori Institute is an anti-racist, anti-biased approach to education using Indigenous knowledge systems and the Montessori Philosophy to deliver teacher training.
Jefferson County Public Schools
Tracy Dorland
Superintendent
JeffCo Public Schools is working with school leaders, educators, youth, and communities to reimagine high school, building schools that prepare students to thrive in their lives after graduation.
Joy as Resistance
Bre Dóvez
Founder & Executive Director
Joy as Resistance increases inclusive, supportive spaces for queer youth. They offer mental health services and mentorship to youth and equip educators, families, and community partners with services and strategies to implement in every space occupied by LGBTQIA2+ youth.
Latinos for Education
Amanda Fernandez
Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Latinos for Education is the first Latino-founded and led national organization solely dedicated to creating leadership pathways for Latinos in education.
Launch Network
Justin Darnell
Co-Founder and Chief Navigator
Launch Network implements a collective impact model, creating authentic whole child learning environments, strengthening and leveraging collaborative adult networks, and engaging intensive multigenerational supports for families.
Learner Studio
Kim Smith
Founder
The LearnerStudio accelerates progress towards a flexible, rigorous, equitable, and learner-centered education system for all youth to thrive in life, career, problem-solving, and citizenship.
LiberatED
Dena Simmons
Founder
LiberatED is a liberatory approach to social and emotional learning (SEL), racial justice, and healing.
Lyra
Mary Seawell
President and Founder
Lyra's Climatarium identifies resources for districts, higher education institutions, and nonprofit partners that are developing academic programming, career readiness pathways, and student leadership opportunities to address the pressing challenges of climate change.
MYPI
Huma Babak Ebadi
Executive Director
Muslim Youth for Positive Impact (MYPI) builds bridges and fosters positive learning environments among youth, community leaders, and schools with the goal of empowering youth to achieve individual success and realize a better tomorrow.
Montessori on Wheels
Tatenda Muchiriri
Founder and Executive Director
Montessori on Wheels is a mobile learning incubator that creates Montessori-based learning environments within BIPOC communities. These learning environments empower families as their child's first educators and create culturally relevant spaces for children to express their joy and creativity.
Moonshot
Kat Ling
Chief Executive Officer
Moonshot edVentures surfaces and supports leaders to design and launch the learning environments of tomorrow, with a particular focus on diversifying the school leadership pipeline with leaders traditionally underrepresented in the field (women and individuals of color).
NewSchools Venture Fund
Frances Messano
President
NSVF is a nonprofit venture philanthropy that invests in promising teams of educators and innovators with the vision and skills to reimagine learning.
One Generation
Kara Bobroff
Executive Director
One Generation incubates Indigenous-led initiatives that support Indigenous culture, languages, and wellness. Inspired by children and families, they craft innovative solutions to the most pressing challenges in education, food systems, and health and wellbeing.
PEBC
Sue Sava
President
PEBC works across Colorado to prepare new teachers, support practicing educators and leaders, and shape policies that foster vibrant growth and lasting success for all students and teachers.
Pahara Institute
Kriste Dragon
Chief Executive Officer
The Pahara Institute identifies, strengthens, and sustains diverse high-integrity leaders who are reimagining public education, so that every child in America has access to an excellent public school.
Promise54
Xiomara Padamsee
Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Promise54 partners with people and organizations within the education sector to solve their toughest talent-related challenges enabling leaders to build organizational cultures where team members from historically marginalized groups can share the full extent of their lived experiences, learn from one another, and bridge perspectives.
Prospect Academy
Mia Coffing
Founding Principal
Prospect Academy (expected to open in Fall '22) provides a safe, calm and inclusive learning environment that educates students with behavioral and learning challenges and prepares them for a successful life from high school to college or career.
RESCHOOL Colorado
Amy Anderson
Executive Director
RESCHOOL is a Colorado-based nonprofit that belives learning happens everywhere. It works alongside families, learning providers, and organizations to address educational inequities so that all young people have the resources to access the learning experiences they choose.
RISE Colorado
Veronica Palmer
Chief Executive Officer
RISE Colorado works to educate, engage, and empower low-income families and families of color to rise as change agents for educational equity through knowledge building, organizing, and leadership development.
Reconstruction
Kaya Henderson
CEO
Reconstruction is an online platform that provides unapologetically Black education highlighting Black people, Black culture, and Black contributions to the country and our world. The learning is authentic and identity-affirming in ways that students of all backgrounds develop a deeper understanding of history and society.
RevX, a program of Transcend
Jennifer Charlot
RevX Co-Founder
Revolutionary Experiences (RevX) creates opportunities for youth to claim their power and transform the world by offering educators tools to design innovative learning experiences that prepare learners to advocate, defend, promote, and question the world around them through building their confidence and deconstructing any mindsets of inferiority.
SCD Enrichment
Shalelia Dillard
Founder & Chief Executive Officer
SCD Enrichment recruits and supports BIPOC middle and high school students in advanced coursework and gifted & talented programs. Through cultural education, mentor support, and peer to peer tutoring, it aims to help students of color feel supported and well-prepared.
Special Education Leader Fellowship
Shannon Garfield
Executive Director
SELF empowers schools to be welcoming and effective communities for all students by developing the capacity of stakeholders through coaching, guidance in systems development, and collaborative trainings.
Springboard Collaborative
Alejandro Gibes de Gac
Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Springboard Collaborative closes the literacy gap by closing the gap between home and school by coaching educators and family members to help kids learn to read by 4th grade.
St. Elizabeth's School
Adriana Murphy
Head of School
St. Elizabeth's is the only independent, K-8 school in Denver with a mission focused on building an economically balanced and inclusive student body where more than 80 percent of families pay discounted tuition and 40 percent are low-income, qualify for Free and Reduced Lunch, and pay significantly discounted tuition.
Surge Institute
Carmita Semaan
Founder and President
The Surge Institute is a national organization that educates and elevates leaders of color, preparing them to transform urban education and expand opportunities for youth.
TACT
Danny Combes
Founder and Chief Executive Officer
Teaching the Autism Community Trades (TACT) is a Denver-based nonprofit organization founded to encourage and empower the full spectrum of individuals with autism through skilled trades education and employment.
The Equity Lab
Michelle Molitor
Executive Director
The Equity Lab seeks to disrupt racial and ethnic inequity by engaging organizations in issues of race, equity, diversity, and inclusion through their fellowships and long-term engagements.
The Grove
Wisdom Amouzou and Olivia Jones
Co-Founders
The Grove seeks to cultivate a community of intergenerational learners through education opportunities grounded in
art, music, and wellness.
The Highland Project
Gabrielle Wyatt
Founder
The Highland Project is building and sustaining a coalition of Black women leading communities, systems, and institutions. Through their work, they aim to create multi-generational wealth and change in the communities where the Highland Project leaders live and serve.
The Justice & Heritage Academy, a progam of Conejos Clean Water
Aaron Abeyta
Co-Founder
Justice & Heritage Academy is a home school cooperative program in rural Colorado that is rooted in Justice education (social justice, food justice, and environmental justice).
The Leadership Academy
Nancy B. Gutiérrez
President & Chief Executive Officer
The Leadership Academy builds the capacity of educational leaders at every level of the system to disrupt systemic inequities, creating academic, social, and emotional opportunities for all students to thrive.
The Reinvention Lab at Teach for America
Sunanna Chand
Executive Director
The Reinvention Lab at Teach For America is a research and development hub that seeks to accelerate the pace of systems-level change in public education by applying lessons learned from the fastest-improving systems and seeding innovative solutions that will spark new breakthroughs in the future of learning.
The Rithm Project
Michelle Culver
Founder
The Rithm Project seeks to explore what human connection in the age of AI looks like for young people through conversation, insight, and action.
The Teaching Well
Lindsey Fuller
Executive Director
The Teaching Well works in partnership with schools nationwide to provide tools for healthy dialogue, emotional regulation, and mindful stress resilience for teachers.
Transcend
Aylon Samouha
Chief Executive Officer
Transcend is a national nonprofit that works with district, charter, and independent school operators across the country to create and spread extraordinary, equitable learning environments that enable all young people to thrive in and transform the world.
Valley Settlement
Maria Tarajano Rodman
Executive Director
Valley Settlement works with immigrant families in the Roaring Fork Valley to promote early childhood development, advance opportunity, and reduce barriers to accessing vital community resources.
Vive Wellness
Yoli G. Casas, M.S.
Founder & Program Director
ViVe Wellness promotes physical health, mental health, leadership, and social well-being for youth across Denver, with a current focus on supporting migrant youth living in shelters in the city through "ViVe School.
Vocal Justice
Shawon Jackson
Founder and Executive Director
Vocal Justice cultivates learning conditions for youth that build community and strengthen their critical consciousness and communication skills.
Youth Empowerment Broadcasting Organization
Cory Montalvo
Founder and Chief Plug
YEBO collaborates with youth to learn how to commit our everyday digital practices to personal and social transformation.