Atlanta Speech School Inc
Public records show a registered, tax-exempt organization in good standing.
What it says it does
The mission of the Atlanta Speech School is to bring deep reading to each and every child so they can find their voice to determine their own future and make the greatest difference in the lives of others.
- Income
- $35.7 million
- Spending
- $34.1 million
- Spent on programs
- 88%
- Reserves
- 16.3 months of spending
- Largest source of income
- fees for its services, 46%
- Employees
- 364
- Volunteers
- 250
- Highest pay
- $232,315, director of rollins center
Source: Form 990 for the year ending May 31, 2026, filed with the Internal Revenue Service. Rating method 2026.2. How we rate
Financial health
Strong: 100 out of 100. Higher than 94% of charities in its peer group (education, $10m to $100m).
Reserves
35 of 35Spendable reserves would cover 16.3 months of spending.
Debt
20 of 20It owes 4% of what it owns.
Living within its means
15 of 15Income exceeded spending by 5% of income.
Income trend
15 of 15Income rose 29% on the year before.
Spending floor
15 of 1588% of spending went to programs and raising each dollar of donations cost 6 cents.
Source: Form 990 for the year ending May 31, 2026, filed with the Internal Revenue Service. Rating method 2026.2. How we rate
Governance
Strong: 100 out of 100. Higher than 50% of charities in its peer group (education, $10m to $100m).
Independent board
25 of 2544 of 45 voting board members are independent.
Conflict of interest policy
15 of 15Has a written conflict of interest policy.
Whistleblower policy
8 of 8Has a written whistleblower policy.
Record keeping policy
7 of 7Has a written policy on keeping and destroying records.
Board minutes
5 of 5Keeps minutes of board meetings.
Board sees the tax return
10 of 10Gave the board a copy of this return before filing it.
Pay set independently
5 of 5Sets its chief executive's pay through independent review and comparison.
Independent check of accounts
15 of 15Its accounts were audited by an independent accountant.
No reported misuse
10 of 10Reports no diversion of assets, excess benefits or loans to insiders.
Source: Form 990 for the year ending May 31, 2026, filed with the Internal Revenue Service. Rating method 2026.2. How we rate
Impact evidence
Describes programs. Its tax return describes what it does but we have found no measurable results in it.
Programs described in its return (3)
- $19.4 million spent. Founded in 1938 as a free school to provide services for children who were deaf or hard of hearing, the modern-day Atlanta Speech School has evolved into the nation's foremost center for advancing language and literacy, providing a continuum of services from infancy through elementary school. As reflected below, the School functions as the educational equivalent of a teaching hospital. On campus, with a staff highly trained in the science of reading, we beat the odds against literacy for children with neurobiological differences (e.g. deafness, speech/language delays and dyslexia). The core purpose of our Rollins Center for Language & Literacy and its free and universally accessible online Cox Campus is to change the odds and break the cycle of illiteracy for all children whose families have experienced generational denied access to educational and economic opportunity.Our Vision Statement is Literacy and Justice for All. Following the legacy of our founder, the School has never turned away a child in need of our services because of their family's financial circumstances.The School has four academic divisions (our elementary school for children with dyslexia and three preschools), our Learning Hub that provides academic and clinical services, and our Rollins Center.
- $8.9 million spent. The School's 22-year-old Rollins Center seeks to extend the social justice of literacy to children far beyond our physical campus. For that purpose, the Cox Campus, with more than 420,000 members from all 50 states and 138 countries, provides training for public health providers, families, and early childhood and elementary teachers on the definitive science of constructing each and every child's deep reading brain.-Cox Campus is the only free IDA-accredited pathway to literacy reform through the science of reading. -With an unmatched 92% course completion rate, the courses of Cox Campus are consistently reported by learners (e.g. Ohio teachers 95%+) to be excellent and significantly contributing to positive changes in classroom instruction practices.-In 2024, as Cox Campus celebrated its first decade, it reached the historic milestone of $100 million in economic impact with more than 668,000 courses completed by educators at no cost to their schools or districts. By the end of the 2025-26 school year with exponential growth, a total of more than 1.4 million courses had been completed, with the value now measuring more than $210 million.-The Atlanta Speech School, the Rollins Center, and its Cox Campus are supported by preeminent national/international experts in the fields of healthy brain development, language acquisition, and literacy who comprise our National Scientific Advisory Council.Below are a few examples of how the School joins with others to implement the science demanded by the public health and moral imperative caused by four centuries of radically disparate access to the freedom of reading.As a starting point, through partnerships with Harvard's Center for the Developing Child and many others, we have built extensive Cox Campus coursework and accompanying thousands of resources for public health providers and teachers of children birth - age 5 in recognition of the need to maximize children's growth in language, executive functions, critical thinking, and empathy during this singular window of brain development.This work begins through Talk With Me Baby ("TWMB") at Grady Hospital's (the largest public hospital in the Southeast) birthing center, where Grady staff coach expecting parents and parents of newborns to become their babies' conversational partners in order for them to provide the language nutrition and connection essential for their babies' healthy early brain development. TWMB is distinguished by its gradual release model in contrast to the typical dissemination of information, encouragement, books, and other materials that effect no measurable change in daily interactions with babies or their feelings of agency. Data from an independent evaluation by Harvard Medical School's Brazelton Center demonstrate the lasting and meaningful success of this effort with 91% of parents reporting they were still using practices five years later. The evaluation shows the comprehensive nature of TWMB at the beginning of life changes parental attitudes and behaviors in a manner that remains with them. With the endorsement of key national early childhood experts, we are now funded for the objective of TWMB's becoming the national standard of care for birthing centers within the next 4 years, including recent adoption by Emory Healthcare across its system.Following passage of the Georgia Early Literacy Act in 2023, the Georgia Department of Education selected Cox Campus as the State's recommended structured literacy training program and created the Georgia Literacy Academy by integrating Cox Campus courses into Georgia Learns, the statewide learning management system. Since then, Cox Campus has become central to Georgia's literacy training infrastructure: more than 55% of Georgia districts now use Cox Campus as their primary resource for complying with structured literacy requirements. As of December 31, 2025, more than 47,000 Georgia educators were enrolled, representing educators and leaders from 167 districts/LEAs, and had completed more than 365,000 courses - an estimated fair market value of more than $55 million delivered at no cost to Georgia districts, schools, or teachers. Collectively, Georgia teachers and leaders have invested more than a million training hours, the equivalent of 124,000 workdays, through the Georgia Literacy Academy.This statewide training infrastructure builds on Rollins' integrated Cox Campus coursework-and-coaching model, which has now been evaluated across Marietta City Schools and KIPP Atlanta. A 2025 three-year evaluation by Jan C. Frijters, PhD, analyzing more than 50,000 NWEA MAP, DIBELS, and STAR records across Kindergarten through Grade 3, found that the Literacy & Justice for All structured-literacy implementation produced large, reliable, and equitable gains. Students added roughly eight to twelve MAP RIT points at each assessment, early participation beginning in preschool or Kindergarten showed a persistent advantage, and growth did not differ meaningfully by race, gender, or school system. The report also found that the model transferred across different educational contexts, with comparable growth patterns between Marietta City Schools and KIPP Atlanta.Building on this evidence and training infrastructure, Georgia adopted the Rollins integrated training-and-coaching model in 2024-25 across the state's 60 most underperforming elementary schools, resulting in students realizing a 15% improvement in reading outcomes in one year. These results, together with the broader evidence from the three-year evaluation, helped elevate literacy coaching as a statewide priority. In 2026, Georgia leaders advanced funding for literacy coaches in all elementary schools, building on the model's demonstrated promise and the state's goal of ensuring every educator has the training and job-embedded support needed to help every child read.Numerous state agencies and partners now help scale access to Cox Campus, with statewide adoption extending across Georgia,
- $1.5 million spent. Through the Learning Hub, the School provides diagnostic, therapeutic and remediation services to both children and adults along the reading brain continuum. These services include Speech-Language (evaluation and therapy for children and adults); Occupational Therapy (pediatric therapy to address sensory integration, handwriting, or fine/gross motor difficulties); and tutoring (specialized individual or small group academic intervention for children struggling academically.)
Source: Form 990 for the year ending May 31, 2026, filed with the Internal Revenue Service. Rating method 2026.2. How we rate
Legitimacy checks
Is it registered with the IRS? Passed.
Listed in the IRS master file of tax-exempt organizations as a 501(c)(3) charitable organization.
Source: Exempt Organizations Business Master File, Internal Revenue Service, file dated October 13, 2026.
Has the IRS revoked its tax-exempt status? Passed.
Not on the IRS automatic revocation list.
Source: Automatic revocation of exemption list, Internal Revenue Service, file dated November 6, 2026.
Are donations tax-deductible? Passed.
On the IRS list of organizations eligible to receive tax-deductible contributions.
Source: Publication 78 data: organizations eligible for tax-deductible contributions, Internal Revenue Service, file dated October 13, 2026.
Is it keeping up with its IRS filings? Passed.
Most recent return on file covers the year ending May 2026.
Source: Exempt Organizations Business Master File, Internal Revenue Service, file dated October 13, 2026.
How long has it been tax-exempt? Passed.
Recognized by the IRS since October 1969.
Source: Exempt Organizations Business Master File, Internal Revenue Service, file dated October 13, 2026.
Is it in good standing with state regulators? Passed.
Not on California's list of charities barred from soliciting. Other states are not yet checked.
Source: May Not Operate or Solicit for Charitable Purposes list, California Attorney General, Registry of Charities and Fundraisers, file dated November 4, 2026.
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