Highlights


The Educational Facilities Financing Center (EFFC) at LISC supports quality public charter schools in distressed neighborhoods. LISC founded the EFFC in 2003 to intensify its national effort in educational facilities financing, and has raised over $95 million in grants and loans for this initiative to date. Since making its first charter school investment in 1997, LISC has provided $105 million in grants, loans or guarantees for 140 schools across the country. The EFFC is supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Prudential Financial, the U.S. Department of Education and the Walton Family Foundation.

Since inception, the EFFC has:

  • Provided more than $105 million in financing for 140 schools across the country, serving more than 56,000 students.
  • Invested $51 million in New Markets Tax Credits for five charter school projects.
  • Raised $95 million for educational facilities initiatives.
  • Published three Landscape studies, detailing public and private funding and financing available for charter school facilities.
  • Published Charter School Bond Issuance: A Complete History, the first study of its kind to examine the 13-year history of the charter school tax-exempt bond market.