A series of events and conversations led to the creation of The Drexel Fund in 2015. Among education practitioners and leaders there was a growing desire to launch an effort to better support the growth and replication of high-quality private schools in states where publicly-funded school choice programs made private education more accessible to low-income families. 

The Drexel Fund Founding Board Member BJ Cassin, after years of serving as a founding board member with the Cristo Rey Network (CRN), combined efforts with John Eriksen, a former Catholic school superintendent, and Rob Birdsell, former President and CEO of CRN, to develop the initial concept for The Drexel Fund. With an initial pledge of $1 million, The Drexel Fund was launched to increase the number of available seats in high performing private schools through new growth and replication. Today, four years since its founding, The Drexel Fund has supported the creation of more than 16,500 new high-quality private school seats in 60 new schools.