At DonorsChoose, we take pride in making connections. Since our founding in 2000, we've mobilized a community of 6.6 million donors made up of individuals, companies, and foundations who are passionate about helping students learn, giving $1.9 billion to classroom resource requests in 92,500 public schools across the country. Their support is more than just helpful, it’s essential; students often need more resources than they have available in the classroom to learn and thrive.
When our supporters give during the back-to-school season, teachers are able to fully stock their classrooms for the year and target their new students' specific needs. Funding campaigns during this season — many backed by our corporate and foundation partners — are one of the main ways we make sure students and teachers have what they need for a great start to the year.
Check out what our community accomplished during the 2025 school year, and get inspired for the one ahead!
Ripple's STEM Innovation Challenge and Match Offer
Using our platform to its full potential, Ripple committed to a 2X match offer on STEM projects, kicking off an Innovation Challenge in which teachers were encouraged to create projects that inspire student interest in STEM. An esteemed judging panel (including artist and activist John Legend, Yale psychology professor Dr. Laurie Santos, early childhood expert Monica J. Sutton, and the Ripple team) selected five teachers with the most innovative projects to win $100,000 to support their classroom and school. Thanks to Ripple and 7,430 members of the DonorsChoose community, over 6,000 teachers got the STEM supplies they needed to ignite their students' passion and curiosity, putting a whopping $2.2 million total towards STEM projects.
Maxwell/Hanrahan's Historically Underfunded Schools Match Offer
A single-day 2X match offer on projects from historically underfunded schools meant the Maxwell/Hanrahan Foundation and 16,000 donors were able to reach 7,900 schools with $3.9 million in funding, ensuring that students facing the biggest barriers to learning got the resources they needed to learn and achieve this school year.
Kamau & Friends Big Student Surprise
Stand-up comic and television host W. Kamau Bell donated his $1 million in Celebrity Jeopardy winnings to rally the public in supporting public school students. Then, he made a proposal: if donors made 10,000 donations on DonorsChoose in a single week, he would unlock a special match code on Friday. W. Bell's Kamau's Big Student Surprise spanned a whole week during the back-to-school season. From Monday to Thursday, we shared videos from school visits featuring Kamau's celebrity friends, encouraging giving on DonorsChoose to unlock the special Friday match code. By the time we reached Friday, our community unlocked a 1.5X sitewide match. In the end, this initiative inspired 29,000 donors to give $6.7 million for teachers and students nationwide.
Back-to-School Boost
In the name of Back-To-School season, we offered our donor community a one-day 1.5X match offer on every request to make sure every classroom had what they needed for a great start to the year. 43,000 of our generous donors supported more than 25,000 projects, leading to a total $8.2 million in funding.
The Power of Our Community
We love our DonorsChoose community of donors. Whether it's a corporate partner aligning their business goals with giving back, a foundation expanding their target to include young learners, or community members who just want every child to have a shot at success: when our donors come together, they make a bright future possible for every child.
Interested in talking about Back-To-School teacher support for Fall 2026? Contact our team.
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