East York Learning Experience
STAR RATINGCi's Star Rating is calculated based on the following independent metrics: |
✔+
FINANCIAL TRANSPARENCY
Audited financial statements for current and previous years available on the charity’s website.
A
RESULTS REPORTING
Grade based on the charity's public reporting of the work it does and the results it achieves.
High
DEMONSTRATED IMPACT
The demonstrated impact per dollar Ci calculates from available program information.
NEED FOR FUNDING
Charity's cash and investments (funding reserves) relative to how much it spends on programs in most recent year.
95%
CENTS TO THE CAUSE
For a dollar donated, after overhead costs of fundraising and admin/management (excluding surplus) 95 cents are available for programs.
My anchor
OVERVIEW
About East York Learning Experience:
East York Learning Experience is a 5-star charity. It has an A results reporting grade, which is above average, and High demonstrated impact. Its overhead spending is just outside Ci’s reasonable range and it has enough reserve funds to cover two years and one month of its annual program costs.
Founded in 1987, East York Learning Experience (EYLE) helps adults improve their reading, writing, basic math, and digital literacy skills. The charity reports that 42% of Canadian adults aged 16-65 have low literacy skills. This prevents them from applying for jobs, filling out forms, and writing letters. EYLE reports that 42% of its learners attained their highest education outside Canada. EYLE reports that it has helped over 1,300 clients since its founding.
A Charity Intelligence 2024 Top 100 Rated Charity
East York Learning Experience works with the Ontario Adult Literacy Curriculum Framework. It uses milestones designed by the Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training & Skills Development to measure progress. EYLE assesses clients’ literacy at intake. It helps clients set goals they want to work towards in the program. Clients can pick one of five goal pathways: independence, employment, adult high school, post-secondary, or apprenticeship. Clients then follow an individualized training plan to meet their literacy goals. They meet with trained volunteer tutors one-on-one once a week. Tutoring typically lasts three months to three years depending on the client’s goals. EYLE follows up with students three, six, and 12 months after they exit the program to check how their increased literacy skills are helping them.
Charity Intelligence calculates EYLE spent $221k on its programs in its fiscal year ending March 2025 (F2025). In F2025, EYLE served 86 clients. EYLE manages 40-50 active learner/tutor pairs at any given time. When they started the program, 71% of EYLE learners had worked in Canada. 5% had worked outside of Canada, and 24% had no work experience. Of those learners unemployed, 59% had been unemployed for more than six years.
My anchor
Results and Impact
EYLE measures outcomes when participants exit the program. The results are as follows for participants exiting the program in F2025:
- 38% of participants achieved greater personal independence.
- 13% of participants became employed. Of those participants, 83% found full-time employment and 17% were employed while also in school.
- 27% of participants pursued further education or training.
While Ci highlights these key results, they may not completely represent East York Learning Experience's results and impact.
Charity Intelligence has given EYLE a High impact rating based on demonstrated impact per dollar spent.
Impact Rating: High
•
My anchor
Finances
EYLE’s audited financial statements follow line-item costing, which is not a best practice. Ci allocated these line items to program, administrative, and fundraising costs on a best-estimate basis. Overhead costs are likely under reported.
In F2025 EYLE received $129k in donations and special events revenues. It also received $126k in government funding. Government funding is 48% of total revenue.
Administrative costs are 5% of revenues (excluding investment income). Fundraising costs are 0.4% of donations. This results in total overhead spending of just less than 5%. For every dollar donated, 95 cents are available to go to the cause. This falls outside Ci’s reasonable range for overhead spending.
In F2025 EYLE spent $221k on its programs, which is 84% of its revenue. In F2025 it had a surplus of $28k, which is 11% of its revenue.
EYLE has $467k in reserve funds (cash and investments). The reserves can cover 212%, or two years and one month of program costs.
EYLE reports it has two permanent, full-time positions on its T3010 filing. However, it lists three permanent, full-time positions in the compensation range section of the T3010.
This charity report is an update that has been sent for review to East York Learning Experience. Changes and edits may be forthcoming.
Updated on July 8, 2025, by Grady Simpson.
Financial Review
Fiscal year ending March
|
2025 | 2024 | 2023 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Administrative costs as % of revenues | 4.6% | 2.9% | 4.1% |
| Fundraising costs as % of donations | 0.4% | 0.0% | 0.1% |
| Total overhead spending | 4.9% | 2.9% | 4.2% |
| Program cost coverage (%) | 211.5% | 212.3% | 146.9% |
Summary Financial StatementsAll figures in $s |
2025 | 2024 | 2023 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Donations | 129,144 | 220,825 | 115,445 |
| Government funding | 126,352 | 137,957 | 142,537 |
| Special events | 9,062 | 6,931 | 8,197 |
| Investment income | 3,046 | 26 | 19 |
| Other income | (5,911) | 13,408 | (2,550) |
| Total revenues | 261,693 | 379,147 | 263,648 |
| Program costs | 220,859 | 205,548 | 193,943 |
| Administrative costs | 11,816 | 10,873 | 10,904 |
| Fundraising costs | 512 | 30 | 100 |
| Other costs | 229 | 92 | 405 |
| Total spending | 233,416 | 216,543 | 205,352 |
| Cash flow from operations | 28,277 | 162,604 | 58,296 |
| Capital spending | 2,223 | 8,794 | 644 |
| Funding reserves | 467,139 | 436,406 | 284,811 |
Note: Deferred adjustment: EYLE uses deferred accounting. To show donors information on a consistent basis, Ci adjusted for these deferred revenues. This affected revenue by ($6k) in F2025, $8k in F2024, and ($350) in F2023. Interest: Ci included interest reported below the line. This affected revenue by $3k in F2025, $26 in F2024, and $19 in F2023. Change in grant receivable: Ci adjusted for change in grant receivable. This affected revenues by $6k in F2024 and ($3k) in F2023. Purchase of capital assets: Ci did not include purchase of capital assets under expenses. This affected expenses by ($2k) in F2025 and ($9k) in F2024.
Salary Information
$350k + |
0 |
$300k - $350k |
0 |
$250k - $300k |
0 |
$200k - $250k |
0 |
$160k - $200k |
0 |
$120k - $160k |
0 |
$80k - $120k |
0 |
$40k - $80k |
2 |
< $40k |
1 |
Information from most recent CRA Charities Directorate filings for F2024
My anchor
Comments & Contact
Comments added by the Charity:
Updated on August 14, 2024:
We’d like to extend a huge thank you to our donors. Your support over the last few years has enabled us to do so much more, improving our programming to better help our students meet their literacy goals.
Some of these enhancements include extending our hours of operation, developing and facilitating a series of 7 workshops which are now run annually, developing a 6-week computer basics class that is being offered in each quarter, student welcome packages and more. Without your help, these initiatives would not have been possible.
Below comments are in reference to a previous profile:
East York Learning Experience has a small staff contingent and thus is a volunteer-driven organization. Each year we rely on the assistance of 50-70 volunteers to work on our Board of Directors, our committees, at fundraising events, and to deliver our literacy services on a one-to-one basis.
Our volunteer tutors go through a screening interview, participate in our tutor training program (small group format 2 to 3 times per year), are then matched with a student and receive ongoing support from staff.
Initially these volunteers make a one year commitment to EYLE. However, many stay with us for several years. Each year we celebrate & honour our volunteers at our Annual Meeting of Members. At this event we recognize our 1,3,5,10,15,20, 25 & 30 year volunteers. These long-term volunteers represent almost ½ of our entire volunteer membership. Their reasons for staying with us may vary, but frequently we hear comments such as:
At EYLE our goal has been to foster a welcoming, relaxed, informal learning environment while delivering professional literacy services that meet the individual needs of our learners. Our success rate with learners and the dedication demonstrated by our staff and volunteers are indicators that we have met this goal.
As an organization with a relatively small budget, we are proud of what we have accomplished and the positive impact we have had on so many lives in our community. Without our committed volunteers and funding support from various levels of government, foundations, corporations, service clubs and the broader community, this would not have been possible.
Thank you for taking the time to learn more about us and the work that we do.
Gail McCullough
Managing Director
East York Learning Experience
Charity Contact
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. Tel: 416-425-2666