Open University: $584.9M Revenue, $536.0M Expenses

The efficiency rubric puts Open University at a B grade: a composite of 73/100 that lands above the national midpoint. The grade reflects solid financial reserves alongside reasonable officer compensation and steady revenue.

Open University is a large nonprofit by U.S. standards: $584.9M in 2020 revenue against $536.0M in expenses. Organizations in this revenue bracket usually run multiple programs with permanent staff and a meaningful endowment or reserve. Financial health is a strength: Open University carries a healthy operating-reserve cushion against $536.0M in annual expenses, the kind of balance-sheet stability that helps an organization weather funding gaps without cutting programs.

Five-year revenue trend is mildly negative: a modest decline that could reflect grant-cycle timing, donor turnover, or program wind-down. Worth checking against the program-spending pattern to see whether the decline is structural. Officer compensation is modest relative to organizational size: Open University reports $2.9M in total compensation for current officers and key employees (Form 990 Part IX, line 5) against $584.9M in revenue. The ratio is well within the bands third-party charity raters consider reasonable at this scale. In the Education category, Open University sits alongside universities, K-12 systems, scholarship funds, and education-research organizations. Education-sector nonprofits often hold large endowments, which affects how the reserves-and-revenue figures should be read.