· Public charity
Association of American Railroads
Aar promotes a safe and efficient north american rail system with principal activities in areas such as standards, operations, safety, security, public affairs and public policy.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
The 13 grants below total $1,843,655 — the rows itemised in this filing. The $1,933,604 headline is the total grant expense reported on the return, so the remaining $89,949 is giving the schedule does not break out: grants under the $5,000 itemisation floor, grants to individuals, and grants reported on other schedules. Every figure below describes the itemised rows only.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k1 grant · $8k
- $10k–50k8 grants · $146k
- $50k–250k2 grants · $224k
- $250k+2 grants · $1.5M
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| COALITION AGAINST BIGGER TRUCKS LLC (CABT) | $750,000 |
| GORAIL | $716,500 |
| UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS GRAINGER COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING | $174,000 |
| SURFACE TRANSPORTATION POLICY PROJECT | $50,000 |
| NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES | $40,655 |
| CONGRESSIONAL BLACK CAUCUS FOUNDATION | $25,000 |
| GOVERNING MAJORITY EDUCATION FUND | $25,000 |
| CONGRESSIONAL BLACK CAUCUS INSTITUTE (CBCI) | $15,000 |
| NATIONAL TROOPERS COALITION AND CHARITABLE FOUNDATION INC | $10,000 |
| METROPOLITAN PLANNING COUNCIL | $10,000 |
| CONGRESSIONAL HISPANIC CAUCUS INSTITUTE INC | $10,000 |
| CONGRESSIONAL FOOTBALL GAME FOR CHARITY INC | $10,000 |
| JOHN W BARRIGER III NATIONAL RAILROAD LIBRARY AT UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI | $7,500 |
Do your dollars go where the need is?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, then read against the area’s typical level.
Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY17–24) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 58% of your dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty linein the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP; grantee ZIP can differ from where services are delivered.
Which US states your grants reach
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are actually delivered. Need from public data — U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.
Who you back again
Which organizations you funded more than once, and which you funded a single time. Each grantee is matched to its own filings.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +30% since the first grant, against +26% for the ones you funded once.
20 repeat relationships — 11 still active in FY2024, 9 since wound down; 2 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Median revenue growth · since first grant
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2024, 99% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $20k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
First-time = a grantee’s first year in your filing window; renewed = funded in an earlier year too. As a portfolio matures the renewed share naturally climbs — once funded, an org stays “renewable” — so the signal is the years that buck it (a new-grantee intake wave). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as “new.” Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.
Backed again, and grew
- GGORAIL8× · 2017–2024 · $4.4M · revenue +14% · 35% of their budget
University of Illinois Foundation7× · 2017–2024 · $1.4M · revenue +127%
NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES7× · 2018–2024 · $300k · revenue +21%
Funded once
GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITYgraduatedone grant, 2017 · $160k · revenue +47%
Northwestern Universitygraduatedone grant, 2020 · $75k · revenue +33%- ATAMERICAN TORT REFORM ASSOCIATIONone grant, 2020 · $30k · revenue +17%
Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.
The map has a center of gravity: the average direction from the rest of the sector toward the organizations the foundation funds — the shape of its giving. Scoring every nonprofit along that direction surfaces the ones that look most like the portfolio. These are the closest matchesthat aren’t grantees — a resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
Founded in 1889, the national association of regulatory utility commisioners (naruc) is a non-profit organization dedicated to representing the state public service commisions who regulate the utilities that provide essential services such…
American gas association's (the association) mission is to develop and advocate for informed, innovative, and durable policy that fulfills our nation's energy needs, environmental aspirations and economic potential. we are committed to…
To advance the practice of higher education attorneys for the benefit of the institutions they serve.
Foster an international, industry-wide collaborative community that delivers innovative applied research, and develops the means for stakeholders to leverage/implement the research.
Ace leads higher education with a united vision for the future, galvanizing our members to make change. the council collaborates across the sector to design solutions for today's challenges, serves the needs of a diverse student…
Aascu is a washington, d.c. based higher education association that represents the sector of over 500 regional public colleges, universities, and systems whose members share a learning and teaching centered culture, a commitment to…
The National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (NAICU) serves as the unified voice for the 1,700 private, nonprofit colleges and universities in our nation. (continued on Schedule O)
National public radio, inc. ("npr") works collaboratively with member public radio station licensees ("member stations") to create a more informed public, one that is challenged and invigorated by a deeper understanding and appreciation of…
The National Academy of Public Administration is an independent, 501(c)(3) nonprofit, non partisan Organization established in 1967 and chartered by Congress in 1984. See Schedule O
To serve all members by advancing expertise in the profession of research administration.
Aacsb international provides quality assurance of business school programs, the latest in business education intelligence, thought leadership, and learning and development services.
To provide information about public policy and national policy alternatives to leaders in business, government, religion, and academia.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Ncsl Foundation for State Legislatures and the most unlike its peers is Fixed Wireless Communications Coalition. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
Your grantees are a median of 40 years old; the field is 16. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 22% startups (under 5 years old) — 0% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 13% of the field you don’t fund.
Age = years since IRS exemption (a founding proxy). “Closed” = auto-revocation for 3 years of non-filing — a floor on closure, not proof, and bigger established orgs lapse least. Association, not causation.
29 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.
Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue from every source. Association, dated; never a causal claim.
Counted here: distinct organizations you funded across 2017–2025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 29 of the 32 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile; the rest are funded organizations whose filings we could not track year by year.
Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee
Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing
Go grantee by grantee — a decade per org, and how each moved after you funded them
A decade per grantee — revenue shaded, your grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
- Who funds GORAIL ↗
- Who funds University of Illinois Foundation ↗
- Who funds SURFACE TRANSPORTATION POLICY PROJECT ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES ↗
- Who funds THE CONGRESSIONAL INSTITUTE INC ↗
- Who funds GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds CONGRESSIONAL BLACK CAUCUS POLITICAL EDU CATION AND LEADERSHIP INSTITUTE ↗
- Who funds Americans for Tax Reform ↗
- Who funds Northwestern University ↗
- Who funds CONGRESSIONAL HISPANIC CAUCUS INSTITUTE INC ↗
- Who funds METROPOLITAN PLANNING COUNCIL ↗
- Who funds NCSL FOUNDATION FOR STATE LEGISLATURES ↗
- Who funds GOVERNING MAJORITY EDUCATION FUND ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN SHORT LINE & REGIONAL RAILROAD ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds CONGRESSIONAL BLACK CAUCUS FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN TORT REFORM ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds JAMES E CLYBURN SCHOLARSHIP AND RESEARCH FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds Operation Lifesaver Inc ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN CHEMISTRY COUNCIL ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF COUNTIES ↗
- Who funds FIXED WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS COALITION ↗
- Who funds RAILROAD RESEARCH FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds REPUBLICAN MAIN STREET PARTNERSHIP ↗
- Who funds REFORMING AMERICA'S TAXES EQUITABLY ↗
- Who funds CONGRESSIONAL FOOTBALL GAME FOR CHARITY INC ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN FOREST & PAPER ASSOCIATION INC ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL TROOPERS COALITION AND CHARITABLE FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds RUTGERS UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds EDISON ELECTRIC INSTITUTE INC ↗
The grantmakers whose grantees overlap with yours far more than size alone predicts. Each orbits closer the stronger the alignment; the arcs between them show where they also fund each other. Here it reads as a tightly interlocked camp — most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: The Business Roundtable Inc · Edison Electric Institute Inc · AARP · American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers · Consumer Technology Association · Nuclear Energy Institute Inc · Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. A research starting point: overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Association of American Railroads funds. Left–right is the share of its income from government; up–down is the share from you. Bigger dots raise more. Filter to federal or a single department — and drag the year to watch it move.
- Rutgers University Foundation — 0% of income from government
Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending — grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check: a grantee that reports government grants we could not trace to a source is left off the chart rather than shown as receiving none. An association, not a claim that your grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first — a floor, not a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12–24 months.