Science Festival Foundation D/B/A World Science Festival

“Brian greene, chairman of the board, is married to tracy day, chief executive officer and board secretary.”

“Due to the size of its board, science festival foundation does not have committees. All meetings of the full board were documented.”

“Prior to filing with the irs, the draft 990 is reviewed internally by the manager of finance, outside general counsel and president of the foundation. They discuss any questions or comments with the foundation's outside preparers, provide suggested language where appropriate and review any revisions made in response to their comments. Once a final draft is ready, management distributes it to the board of directors prior to filing with the irs.”

“The foundation's outside general counsel distributes the conflict of interest policy and conflict of interest questionnaire to each officer, director and key employee on an annual basis, and follows up with each individual to ensure that the questionnaire has been completed. Each officer, director and key employee is asked to certify annually that he/she has reviewed the foundation's conflict of interest policy and has disclosed any potential or actual conflicts on the questionnaire. The outside general counsel reviews the responses to the questionnaire to determine if there is anything disclosed that should be brought to the attention of the board. The questionnaires are maintained with the books and records of the foundation. In addition to filling out the questionnaire, pursuant to the foundation's policy, each officer, director and key employee is required to alert the other members of the board if a transaction or fact arises that could be covered by the foundation's policy after the individual has completed his or her annual questionnaire. If the general counsel identifies any transaction that might present a conflict of interest, actual or perceived, he or she would confer with the president and chair to discuss how it should be disclosed to the rest of the board.”

“Executive and officer compensation is reviewed and approved by the board of directors. The outside general counsel, manager of finance and president review and compile publicly available compensation information for similar positions at comparable organizations, as well as compensation surveys. This information is distributed and discussed at a meeting of the board out of the presence of the individual whose compensation is being reviewed. At that point in the meeting, any remaining board members who have an interest in the compensation (such as family members of the employee or officer) are excused from the meeting. The disinterested board members determine whether the proposed compensation is reasonable in light of the comparables reviewed and the work being performed by the individual in question, and vote on the compensation package. The deliberation and vote on compensation are recorded in the minutes of the board meeting, which are approved by the directors at the next scheduled board meeting.”

“The foundation makes its audited financial statements, conflict of interest policy and governing documents available to the public upon request.”

“The chief executive officer's earnings of $270,000 for tracy k. Day includes an annual salary of $215,000 plus payment of $55,000 as partial payment for work performed in 2006 through 2008 during the first years of operations when ms. Day worked full-time without any compensation. The balance due to ms. Day for compensation for the 2006-2008 years is being paid out over a five year period.”

“Loss on fundraising event in this current fiscal year, the organization is showing a net loss from the fund raising event as the form 990 has excluded $709,172 of contributions that were received specifically for the fundraising event. (see line 8a, part viii). These contributions are shown on line 1c, part viii. If these contributions were included with the fundraising revenue shown on line 8a, the net income from the event would be $526,834.”

“Subsequent to the filing year end, on december 14, 2015, the organization amended its certificate of incorporation to change its name from the science festival foundation, science to world science foundation. The bylaws were also amended to change the fiscal year from june 30 to september 30 for years subsequent to this reporting year.”

“Pending transaction with interested parties: in october 2012, the foundation entered into a non-binding term sheet with an entity (the "company") owned by the foundation's co-founders, who serve as directors and officers of the foundation as ceo and board chair, in connection with the parties' collaboration on a new digital educational initiative (the "project"). The term sheet contemplates that the company would be compensated for the board chair's significant contributions to the project in a manner commensurate with his contributions should the initiative produce any revenues, and grants the company a non-exclusive license to use certain intellectual property developed as part of the project for educational purposes on a non-commercial basis. The board chair has created the academic content underlying the project, and has provided his expertise and project management services free of charge thus far. Management is in the process of negotiating a final agreement with the company.”

“Other fees: program service expenses 487,960. Management and general expenses 125,766. Fundraising expenses 71,961. Total expenses 685,687.”

“Festival production costs significant expenses which are part of the festival production costs on line 24a, part ix, include video taping, video production, venue rentals, venue producers/managers, set scenery and venue operations labor.”

“Auditor selection and oversight process: the oversight process and the selection process that the organization uses for the oversight of its auditors has not changed from the prior year. Oversight of the audit is done by the entire board of directors.”