The Park City Education Foundation has committed $1.9 million in grants for the 2026-27 school year. The nonprofit started with a single $2,000 check in 1986.

That first grant sent two Park City High School students to a Stanford University space camp after a teacher rallied community members to pool the money, according to the Park Record. Forty years later, the foundation, known as PCEF, funds preschool, afterschool care, arts instruction, STEM programs and college support across all Park City School District campuses, reaching 4,200 students.

"We started in 1986 with one $2,000 grant and have grown to supporting almost $2 million in grants that support students and teachers in the school district," PCEF President and CEO Ingrid Whitley told the Park Record in August. "What a history."

The foundation's 2025-26 programmatic budget stood at $1.8 million. For 2026-27, PCEF has increased that commitment to $1.9 million, covering sustaining grants for elementary visual arts, preschool at every elementary school, afterschool programs at all elementary and middle school sites, and the Bright Futures college-readiness program.

The numbers add up fast. PCEF spends roughly $350,000 a year on afterschool scholarships alone to keep the program affordable. Erin Price-Proctor, a Parley's Park Elementary graduate whose children now attend the same school, said on the foundation's website that affordable afterschool care helps keep families in the district.

The Bright Futures program, which supports first-generation college students, has guided about 200 students over nine years. Twenty-five have graduated college, a 64% completion rate that tops the roughly 24% national average for first-generation students, according to PCEF. The program is expanding to serve all roughly 230 first-generation students at Park City High School by embedding a dedicated counselor and college-readiness programming into the school day.

Joanna Andres, Utah's 2026 Teacher of the Year and a Park City School District educator, told the Park Record in an Aug. 7 story that she had never taught in a place supported by a nonprofit like PCEF.

The growth traces in part to former President and CEO Abby McNulty, who led PCEF from 2008 to June 2023 and grew annual fundraising from $50,000 to more than $2 million. Whitley succeeded her in January 2024.

PCEF's 40th-anniversary Red Apple Gala is scheduled for Nov. 14 at Montage Deer Valley. A previous gala raised nearly $600,000. The foundation's Annual Family Appeal is also underway.