The David and Nicole Tepper Foundation is committing $3.4 million to expand its partnership with Vision To Learn, a nonprofit that brings no-cost eye exams and prescription glasses directly to elementary and middle schoolers during the school day. The new funding is expected to reach more than 40,000 students across North and South Carolina, pushing the foundation's total investment in the organization past $5.2 million since the relationship began.
The commitment builds on a $1.5 million, five-year pledge the foundation made in 2024, which brought Vision To Learn's mobile clinics to Charlotte-Mecklenburg and Charleston counties, according to the Carolina Panthers. That original push kicked off with events at Matilda F. Dunston Elementary in North Charleston and Renaissance West STEAM Academy in Charlotte, delivering glasses to more than 250 students during the launch. David and Nicole Tepper have championed Vision To Learn's work in the Carolinas since 2019, and the couple said they are proud to deepen their commitment and bring essential no-cost eye care to more students in need across the region.
Through the partnership so far, Vision To Learn has completed 56,641 eye exams, facilitated 165,764 eye screenings, and provided 50,426 pairs of glasses to students across the Carolinas as of August, per the team's announcement. The nonprofit now operates in four regions across the two states — Charlotte-Mecklenburg, Charleston, Raleigh-Durham, and Greenville-Spartanburg — with programming already underway in the two newly expanded markets.
New Markets, New Assemblies
Vision To Learn will extend its school-based model into Raleigh-Durham and Greenville-Spartanburg, with special school assembly events planned later this month to mark what the foundation is calling the next phase of the partnership. Carolina Panthers and Charlotte FC representatives, along with foundation staff, are set to join those assemblies — a tactic the Panthers say helps destigmatize wearing prescription glasses among elementary and middle schoolers by pairing the visits with recognizable local athletes.
Vision To Learn founder Austin Beutner said more than 4 million children across the country attend school without the glasses they need, a gap the David and Nicole Tepper Foundation says is central to its focus on addressing basic needs and expanding access to educational resources throughout the Carolinas. The couple said they believe clear vision plays a crucial role in a child's ability to read and participate fully in the classroom.
Why the Need Runs So Deep
The scale of unmet need in the Charlotte area alone helps explain why the expansion matters. An estimated 13,000 students in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools attend class without the eyeglasses they need, and since establishing its local footprint in 2018, Vision To Learn has conducted nearly 100,000 vision screenings and delivered almost 30,000 pairs of glasses in that market alone. When the nonprofit launched its South Carolina operations in 2021, state estimates indicated roughly 120,000 public school students statewide lacked the eyeglasses required to succeed in class.
Research helps explain why those numbers translate directly into classroom struggles. Up to 80% of what children learn during their first 12 years of school is visually driven, yet up to 95% of children who need glasses in low-income communities go without them, according to research compiled by All About Vision. A three-year clinical trial led by Johns Hopkins University researchers and published in JAMA Ophthalmology found that providing eyeglasses through school-based vision programs significantly boosted reading and math scores among more than 2,300 elementary and middle school students, with the biggest gains showing up among kids who had struggled the most beforehand.
Clearing a Legal Hurdle in South Carolina
Vision To Learn's ability to operate in South Carolina schools at all traces back to a 2022 change in state law. Governor Henry McMaster signed House Bill 4387 that May, removing longstanding legal barriers that had previously restricted mobile optometric clinics from operating on public school grounds, which cleared the way for the nonprofit to serve Title I schools statewide.
North Carolina, meanwhile, already requires vision checks at the front end of a child's schooling. Under state law, every child enrolling in public kindergarten must obtain a vision screening within 180 days of starting the school year, and any student who fails that screening is required to get a comprehensive eye exam. But a screening alone does not put glasses on a child's face — it is the follow-up exam and the prescription lenses that mobile programs like Vision To Learn are built to deliver, especially for families who face cost or logistical barriers to a traditional eye doctor visit.
Founded in Los Angeles in 2012 by former LAUSD superintendent Austin Beutner, Vision To Learn has grown into the nation's largest school-based eye-care nonprofit, running mobile clinics across 15 states and Washington, D.C. Carolina Panthers owner David Tepper landed on the Time 100 Philanthropy list this past May after surpassing $529 million in cumulative charitable giving, a portfolio that spans higher education, youth sports, and public health across the Carolinas.
