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· Private foundation

Cleveland Avenue Foundation for Education

Its FY2025 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$266k
Granted FY2025still arriving
6
Grants FY2025still arriving
2
States reached
$196k
Largest
01What you fundRead
02The needRead
03Your edgeRead
04Your fieldRead
05Through PlinthRead
01What you fund
0198% classified

What you funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2019–2025.

Science & Tech$1.0MEducation$885kYouth Development$350kReligion$196kArts & Culture$85kCommunity Improvement$39kPhilanthropy$35kOther$0
02FY2025 · 6 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

By grant size · FY2025

  • $10k–50k5 grants · $70k
  • $50k–250k1 grant · $196k
$15,000
Median grant
2
States reached
$1.5M
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
APOSTOLIC CHURCH OF GOD$195,838
BRAVEN INC$25,000
KIDS FIRST CHICAGO$15,000
ONEGOAL$10,000
CITY YEAR INC$10,000
PARTNERSHIP FOR COLLEGE COMPLETION$10,000
02The need
03

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.

show:

Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY19–25) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 12%. 100% of your dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 12%CITY YEAR INC: $25k → 16%COLLEGE POSSIBLE: $25k → 14%PURDUE RESEARCH FOUNDATION: $1.0M → 19%CHICAGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY: $25k → 14%CAMELBACK VENTURES: $25k → 23%CITY YEAR INC: $25k → 16%BRAVEN INCORPORATED: $40k → 14%BRAVEN INC: $25k → 14%BRAVEN INC: $25k → 14%BRAVEN INCORPORATED: $25k → 14%BOTTOM LINE: $15k → 16%BRAVEN INCORPORATED: $25k → 14%BOTTOM LINE: $15k → 16%BRAVEN INC: $25k → 14%BRAVEN INC: $25k → 14%KIDS FIRST CHICAGO: $25k → 14%KIDS FIRST CHICAGO: $25k → 14%KIDS FIRST CHICAGO: $25k → 14%KIDS FIRST CHICAGO: $15k → 14%KIDS FIRST CHICAGO: $15k → 14%BLACK ENSEMBLE THEATER CORPORATION: $25k → 14%ILLINOIS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY: $25k → 14%CHICAGO SCHOLARS FOUNDATION: $25k → 14%ILLINOIS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY: $25k → 14%CHICAGO PUBLIC MEDIA: $25k → 14%PROJECT SYNCERE: $25k → 14%PROJECT SYNCERE: $25k → 14%PROJECT SYNCERE: $25k → 14%CHICAGO STATE FOUNDATION: $40k → 14%APOSTOLIC CHURCH OF GOD: $196k → 14%CAFE GROUP: $6.3M → 14%THE CAFE GROUP: $2.6M → 14%ONEGOAL: $25k → 14%ONEGOAL: $25k → 14%SURGE INSTITUTE: $25k → 14%THE SURGE INSTITUTE: $25k → 14%SURGE INSTITUTE: $25k → 14%Partnership for College Completion: $25k → 14%PARTNERSHIP FOR COLLEGE COMPLETION: $25k → 14%PARTNERSHIP FOR COLLEGE COMPLETION: $25k → 14%Partnership for College Completion: $25k → 14%PARTNERSHIP FOR COLLEGE COMPLETION: $25k → 14%CITY COLLEGES OF CHICAGO: $25k → 14%ONEGOAL: $25k → 14%CITY COLLEGES OF CHICAGO: $25k → 14%ONEGOAL: $25k → 14%ONEGOAL: $25k → 14%CITY COLLEGES OF CHICAGO: $25k → 14%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

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

MN
IL
WI
NY
MA
IN
CA
CO
LA

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.

03Your edge
repeat funding

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.

88%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.
$10.0M · 17 repeat orgs$1.4M to everyone else

And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +31% since the first grant, against +11% for the ones you funded once.

17 repeat relationships — 5 still active in FY2025, 12 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

17
17

Total granted

$10.0M
$1.2M

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+31%
+11%

Still filing today

88%
71%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 26% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $196k went to new ones.

50%100%’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
EducationPhilanthropyYouth DevelopmentCommunity ImprovementArts & CultureEmploymentOther

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

  • BI
    BRAVEN INC
    7× · 2019–2025 · $190k · revenue +97%
  • O
    ONEGOAL
    7× · 2019–2025 · $150k · revenue +51%
  • TP
    The Partnership for College Completion
    7× · 2019–2025 · $145k · revenue +32%

Funded once

  • Purdue Research Foundation
    one grant, 2019 · $1.0M · revenue +11%
  • CH
    CHICAGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY
    one grant, 2024 · $25k · revenue -11%
  • CV
    CAMELBACK VENTURES
    one grant, 2020 · $25k · revenue -69%

Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Your field

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.

1
Central Indiana Corporate Partnership Inc

Central indiana corporate partnership (cicp) is an alliance of indiana's business and research university leaders coming together to foster long-term prosperity for the region. cicp's mission is to transform the economy of indiana in order…

Community Improvement
2
Kipp Chicago Schools

The team at kipp chicago schools is guided by a simple, yet powerful mission: to create a network of excellent schools in chicago that teach our students the character and academic skills necessary to succeed in college and beyond, and to…

Education
3
Columbia College Chicago

The organization's mission is to educate students for creative occupations in diverse fields of arts and media.

Education
4
The Common Application Inc

The common application is a not-for-profit membership organization of over 1,100 colleges and universities across the globe committed to access, equity, and integrity in the college admission process. every year, over 1.5 million students…

Education
5
Chicago Collegiate Inc

To equip all students in grades six through twelve with the academic skills, intellectual habits and character traits to succeed in the college of their choice, strenghten their communities and change the world.

Education
6
Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute

The chicago psychoanalytic institute transforms the lives of individuals, families and communities, using psychoanalytic knowledge to help them grow and thrive.

Social Science
7
University of Chicago

The mission of the university of chicago has been to sustain at the highest level of excellence, the communication of knowledge, the creation of knowledge and the fostering of a dynamic community of scholars and students.

Education
8
Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce

The chicagoland chamber of commerce combines the power of people, with our legacy of leadership and business advocacy, to drive a dynamic economy. we focus on delivering value for our members, making chicagoland a world-class place to live…

—
9
The Chicago School of Professional Psychology

The Chicago School educates the next generation of change-makers in innovative theory and culturally competent practice to strengthen the integrated health of individuals, organizations, and communities.

Education
10
AI4ALL

Ai4all's mission is to ensure that the next generation of ai leaders reflects humanity. ai4all is transforming the pipeline of ai practitioners who will shape ai for the benefit of humanity.

Youth Development
11
Chicago Education Partnership

To create a school that dramatically transforms the lives of k-8 students and prepares them for success in college and in life through: the delivery of a rigorous and personalized academic program, a focus on holistic education, and the…

Education
12
College Summit Inc

College summit, inc. d/b/a peerforward (peerforward)'s mission is to unleash the power of positive peer influence to transform the lives of youth living in low-income communities by connecting them to college and careers. in low-income…

Education

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Kids First Chicago for Education and the most unlike its peers is Illinois Institute of Technology. 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 27 years old; the field is 18. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.

THE FIELDby orgYOUR GRANTEESby number20%3%<5yr14%3%5–10yr18%29%10–20yr18%29%20–35yr14%16%35–55yr16%19%55yr+
THE FIELDby orgYOUR MONEYby value20%2%<5yr14%6%5–10yr18%18%10–20yr18%18%20–35yr14%6%35–55yr16%52%55yr+

The field is 20% startups (under 5 years old) — 3% of your grantees by number, and just 2% of your money.

Closures · last 5 years

The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 15% of the field you don’t fund.

orgs you fund
0.0%0/31
the rest of the field
15%
5,697/38,192

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.

04the grantee network

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 36 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.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
4
Early backer (in before they grew)
28/29
Grantees still filing
22/29
Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

Individual grant recipient — $8,804,109 · OtherIndividual grant recipient+7 more — $394,838 · OtherPurdue Research Foundation — $1,000,000 · EducationPurdue Research …The Partnership for College Completion — $145,000 · EducationThe Partnership …KIDS FIRST CHICAGO FOR EDUCATION — $135,000 · EducationKIDS FIRST CHICA…PROJECT SYNCERE — $75,000 · EducationSURGE INSTITUTE — $75,000 · Education+9 more — $194,966 · Education+9 moreBRAVEN INC — $190,000 · Youth DevelopmentONEGOAL — $150,000 · Youth Development+1 more — $10,250 · Youth DevelopmentTHE BOTTOM LINE INC — $40,000 · Community ImprovementCAMELBACK VENTURES — $25,000 · Community ImprovementChicago Women in Philanthropy — $10,000 · Community ImprovementCHICAGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY — $25,000 · Arts & CultureCHICAGO PUBLIC MEDIA INC — $25,000 · Arts & CultureBLACK ENSEMBLE THEATER CORPORATION — $25,000 · Arts & CultureCHARTER FUND INC D/B/A CHARTER SCHOOL GROWTH FUND — $40,000 · PhilanthropyFOREFRONT — $10,000 · PhilanthropyREFLECTION FOUNDATION — $5,000 · PhilanthropyThe Chicago Community Trust — $5,000 · PhilanthropyCHICAGO URBAN LEAGUE — $10,000 · Employment
Other$9,198,947Education$1,624,966Youth Development$350,250Community Improvement$75,000Arts & Culture$75,000Philanthropy$60,000Employment$10,000

Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ your share of their budgetPurdue Research Foundation — $1,000,000 over 1y, 0.5% of budgetBRAVEN INC — $190,000 over 7y, 0.4% of budgetONEGOAL — $150,000 over 7y, 0.1% of budgetThe Partnership for College Completion — $145,000 over 7y, 2.2% of budgetKIDS FIRST CHICAGO FOR EDUCATION — $135,000 over 7y, 0.8% of budgetCITY YEAR INC — $100,000 over 7y, 0.0% of budgetPROJECT SYNCERE — $75,000 over 3y, 1.6% of budgetSURGE INSTITUTE — $75,000 over 3y, 0.8% of budgetIllinois Institute of Technology — $50,000 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetChicago State Foundation — $45,000 over 2y, 1.1% of budgetCHARTER FUND INC D/B/A CHARTER SCHOOL GROWTH FUND — $40,000 over 4y, 0.0% of budgetTHE BOTTOM LINE INC — $40,000 over 3y, 0.1% of budgetTHE CHICAGO SCHOLARS FOUNDATION — $31,500 over 3y, 0.4% of budgetCHICAGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY — $25,000 over 1y, 0.2% of budgetCAMELBACK VENTURES — $25,000 over 1y, 0.2% of budgetCHICAGO PUBLIC MEDIA INC — $25,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetCOLLEGE POSSIBLE INC — $25,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetBLACK ENSEMBLE THEATER CORPORATION — $25,000 over 1y, 0.9% of budgetTeach for America Inc — $20,000 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetGARY COMER YOUTH CENTER INC — $10,250 over 4y, 0.1% of budgetEPIC Academy — $10,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetFOREFRONT — $10,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetChicago Women in Philanthropy — $10,000 over 1y, 8.9% of budgetBRIDGE BUILDERS FOUNDATION INC — $10,000 over 1y, 0.5% of budgetCHICAGO URBAN LEAGUE — $10,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetREFLECTION FOUNDATION — $5,000 over 1y, 1.2% of budgetThe Chicago Community Trust — $5,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetADVANCE ILLINOIS NFP — $2,466 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetCHICAGO PUBLIC EDUCATION FUND — $1,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budget
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.

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.

Polk Bros Foundation …The Chicago Community…Arie and Ida Crown Me…Circle of Service Fou…John D and Catherine …Vivo FoundationRobert R McCormick Fo…The Joyce FoundationCme Group FoundationFulk Family Foundatio…The Osa FoundationSquare One Foundation
Polk Bros Foundation IncIL25.9× affinity10 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Polk Bros Foundation Inc · The Chicago Community Trust · Arie and Ida Crown Memorial · Circle of Service Foundation · John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation · Vivo Foundation · Robert R McCormick Foundation · The Joyce Foundation · Cme Group Foundation · Fulk Family Foundation Inc · The Osa Foundation · Square One Foundation

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 Cleveland Avenue Foundation for Education 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.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 00%1%3%6%10%your share of their income ↑0%19%38%56%75%share of the org’s income from government →median 11%
  • City Year Inc — 11% of income from government
  • The Bottom Line Inc — 0% of income from government
no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
0get no government money at all
7report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
0rely on government for over half their income
⤢ axis zoomed · 0–75%
typical government reliance, FY20–25

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.

05Through Plinth

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Cleveland Avenue Foundation for Education?

Find your warmest path to Cleveland Avenue Foundation for Education through trustees and officers whose names appear on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the shortest route it can evidence.

Each link is a name appearing on two organizations’ public IRS 990 filings, matched on that name and, where the filings support it, on location. A same-state match has geographic support, which is a second matching feature rather than confirmation that the two are one person; a cross-state one is the likeliest to be two people who share a name. Every hop shows its tier, low-confidence and distant paths are held back rather than guessed, and it is worth confirming the person before you use the introduction.

On method. Every financial figure here is read directly from IRS e-file XML — your own 990/990-PF and the multi-year returns of the 36 grantees we resolved across every year we hold, several hundred filings in all (a different count from the grant rows on the cover, which are one fiscal year)— each linked to its source. Grantee achievements and outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III); we read these as association with sustained funding — the foundation is one of several forces — suppress low-confidence name matches rather than guess, and say so where a figure rests on a single grant or filing. Not everything on this page is a filed figure, and the difference matters. Filed is what you reported on your return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears. How we build these →

Generated from your IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

More from the funding graph

The unnamed billions
grants reported with no recipient in the public record
The regranting layer
51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer
The DAF merry-go-round
$9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds
The camps
funders cluster by geography, not ideology
By state
where grant money is based, and what stays home
State money flows
the interactive map of money crossing state lines