Monitoring Long Term Performance
A Look at Charities with Consistently Healthy Finances and those with Chronically Poor Fiscal Health
June 1, 2009
Charity Navigator was created to help charitable givers make intelligent giving decisions. To accomplish this task, we designed a rating system that measures the efficiency and sustainability of charities objectively and without bias. Since launching our site in 2002, our team of professional analysts has completed and published an astonishing number of over 31,000 ratings --- making us the largest charity rating service.
Reviewing the wealth of historical data we've collected, it is apparent that there are far more charities committed to financial excellence than there are charities with continually inefficient operations. More than two thirds of the charities we’ve reviewed have either a 3-star or 4-star rating. Less than 2% have a 0-star rating.
Keeping in mind that the average charity in our database has received five ratings, with nine being the maximum number of evaluations a single charity has received, let's look at how many charities have had consecutive 4-star ratings versus how many have had consecutive 0-star ratings.
| Charities with Consecutive 4-Star Ratings | Charities with Consecutive 0-Star Ratings |
|---|---|
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The 1,024 charities with at least two consecutive 4-star ratings are distributed among all of the categories of charities. Therefore, no matter the donor’s philanthropic passion, a consistently excellent charity can be found. But certain categories have a greater concentration of these charities than others. As the following chart depicts, nearly 30% of the International charities have at least two consecutive 4-star ratings whereas only about 9% of the Arts, Culture, Humanities charities meet this benchmark.
Again, Charity Navigator was created to help donors give with confidence and in doing so, also to assist charities by generating awareness of those with the most efficient and effective operations. We celebrate the charities that stand out in this crowded sector by presenting this list of outstanding charities that have earned eight consecutive 4-star ratings (as of June 1, 2009).
| Charities With 8 Consecutive 4-Star Ratings | Overall Score |
|---|---|
| Breast Cancer Research Foundation | 64.18 |
| Carnegie Institution for Science | 66.53 |
| Carnegie Mellon University | 66.52 |
| Case Western Reserve University | 66.96 |
| Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston | 61.77 |
| Christian Foundation for Children and Aging | 64.46 |
| Columbia University | 64.59 |
| Cornell University | 65.66 |
| Dana-Farber Cancer Institute | 63.84 |
| Food For The Poor | 62.18 |
| Goodwill Southern California | 61.75 |
| Harvard University | 65.66 |
| Johns Hopkins University | 65.50 |
| Loma Linda University | 64.86 |
| New York University | 66.98 |
| Northeastern University | 68.84 |
| Rochester Institute of Technology | 62.09 |
| Stanford University | 67.02 |
| The Children's Aid Society | 65.49 |
| The Scripps Research Institute | 61.49 |
| University of Miami | 66.79 |
| University of Southern California | 64.24 |
| Vanderbilt University | 69.27 |
| Washington University in St. Louis | 66.14 |
| Yale University | 65.57 |
| YMCA of the Greater Houston Area | 63.17 |
Of course, warning the public about poorly run charities is also part of our work. So we offer the following list of all of the charities that have received consecutive 0-star ratings (as of our June 1, 2009 ratings update).
