Private Capital Does What Bureaucracy Won't
North Carolina teachers spend an average of $1,632 of their own money each year to stock their classrooms — a 22% year-over-year jump and the second-highest figure in the country, according to a 2025 study by consumer platform CouponBirds. Pennsylvania edges the state by just $5. The national average sits at $1,021.
This week, a private foundation decided it had seen enough.
Exponential Scholars announced Monday it funded every open North Carolina project on DonorsChoose, the platform that connects teachers in high-need communities to donors willing to cover classroom supplies. The group's $2.25 million donation will reach more than 3,200 classroom projects across more than 1,000 schools in the state.
The foundation was established in 2025 by Holly May, who serves as its president and CEO. May grew up in rural North Carolina in the 1990s in a hometown of just 2,000 people with a single elementary school. A full financial-aid scholarship to an independent school and a full ride to Harvard College, followed by a business career in San Francisco, shaped her conviction that 'good fortune comes with a duty to pay it forward.' She and her husband Travis returned to North Carolina to raise their family and launched Exponential Scholars to support gifted students in overlooked communities.
'I still believe in the American Dream,' May wrote. 'Mine came true: work hard, use your gifts, and it pays off…and you leave your kids more room for ambition and optimism than you had.'
The numbers behind the gift are striking. The CouponBirds survey found that 95% of teachers reported dipping into their own wallets for classroom materials, and 82% said their classrooms would suffer without it. North Carolina's average teacher salary for the 2023–24 school year was $58,292, ranking the state 43rd nationally and landing nearly $14,000 below the national average, according to the National Education Association. The Economic Policy Institute estimates teachers earn just 73 cents for every dollar made by similarly educated professionals.
The practice of clearing teacher supply wishlists in bulk is known as 'flash-funding.' A notable earlier example came in 2015, when Stephen Colbert partnered with two organizations to cover roughly 1,000 South Carolina classroom projects with an $800,000 donation. In 2018, cryptocurrency company Ripple funded every open project on DonorsChoose nationwide — some 35,647 campaigns — with a gift valued at $29 million.
DonorsChoose itself was founded in 2000 by former teacher Charles Best. More than 6 million supporters have contributed nearly $2 billion to more than 3 million projects, supporting more than 92,000 schools. In North Carolina alone, more than 143,000 projects have been funded through the platform.
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The story here is not complicated. A woman who escaped poverty through merit, scholarship, and hard work built a fortune — and then voluntarily deployed it where government budgets have repeatedly failed. No committee. No appropriations hearing. No bureaucratic delay. The books, pencils, and lab equipment are simply on their way.
When private philanthropy moves $2.25 million in a single announcement and reaches more than 1,000 schools before a government agency could finish drafting the paperwork, the market has already voted. Free enterprise creates the wealth; free individuals decide where it does the most good. That is the American Dream May says she still believes in — and this week, she proved it works.
