How much does Cooper Foundation give?

Cooper Foundation reported 24 grants totaling $2,106,251 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 19 and 25 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.

What does Cooper Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are Health (18%), Community Improvement (14%), Arts & Culture (13%).

Who are Cooper Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: Heart of Texas Community Health Center Inc ($1.0M), Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas Inc ($1.0M), Greater Waco Collective Impact Initiative ($980k).

Does Cooper Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2024, 24% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Which funders back the same organizations as Cooper Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Waco Foundation, Bernard & Audre Rapoport Foundation, United Way of Waco-McLennan County.

Where is Cooper Foundation based?

Cooper Foundation is based in TX.

Foundation Dossiers Also receives grants: funding profile →

Texas · Public charity

Cooper Foundation

To make waco, tx a better or more desirable city in which to live, which is accomplished by giving grants to local nonprofit organizations.

$2.1M
Granted FY2025(still arriving): 24
Grants FY2025: 25
Organizations funded FY2024: 24%
First-time grantees FY2024

Read the full brief

Median grant, FY2025: $46,300
Largest grant, FY2025: $316,978
Organizations funded a year: 19 to 25; FY2018 to FY2024
States reached, FY2025: 1
Total assets, FY2025: $103M

How open it is to new grantees

In FY2024, 24% of the organizations Cooper Foundation funded were first-time grantees, receiving 26% of its grant dollars.

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 74% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $529k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Human ServicesCommunity ImprovementArts & CultureHealthEducationCrime & LegalOther

How this is measured

First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as new. Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.

The numbers by year

Fiscal year	Organizations funded	To those organizations	First-time grantees
FY2025still arriving	22	$2.0M	14%
FY2024	25	$2.0M	24%
FY2023	24	$2.1M	17%
FY2022	20	$2.7M	15%
FY2021	25	$1.4M	24%
FY2020	19	$1.4M	21%
FY2019	25	$1.8M	56%
FY2018	23	$1.2M	70%

100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.

Health$2.9MCommunity Improvement$2.2MArts & Culture$2.1MHuman Services$1.8MEducation$1.6MCrime & Legal$1.2MHousing & Shelter$1.0MFood & Nutrition$601kOther$0

Top grantees

Largest recipients by total granted, FY2017 to FY2025, and the share of each one’s budget the grants supplied at peak.

Grantee	Total granted	Years	Share of their budget
Heart of Texas Community Health Center Inc	$1,041,491	4	1%
Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas Inc	$1,000,000	5	1%
Greater Waco Collective Impact Initiative	$980,179	5	20%
Waco Community Development Corporation Dba Grassroots Community Development	$853,292	7	31%
Baylor University	$611,405	8	0%
Casa of McLennan County	$463,345	6	19%
The Salvation Army	$436,045	4	n/a
McLennan Community College Foundation Attn Christopher Qualls	$434,895	3	6%
Dr Pepper Museum and Free Enterprise Institute	$406,305	5	7%
Waco Creative Art Center	$406,264	4	18%

Show all 71 grantees

All grantees of Cooper Foundation by total granted
Grantee	Total granted	Years	Share of their budget
Heart of Texas Community Health Center Inc	$1,041,491	4	1%
Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas Inc	$1,000,000	5	1%
Greater Waco Collective Impact Initiative	$980,179	5	20%
Waco Community Development Corporation Dba Grassroots Community Development	$853,292	7	31%
Baylor University	$611,405	8	0%
Casa of McLennan County	$463,345	6	19%
The Salvation Army	$436,045	4	n/a
McLennan Community College Foundation Attn Christopher Qualls	$434,895	3	6%
Dr Pepper Museum and Free Enterprise Institute	$406,305	5	7%
Waco Creative Art Center	$406,264	4	18%
American Gateways	$403,000	3	5%
Waco Habitat for Humanity	$364,800	7	6%
Heart of Texas Region Mental Health Mental Retardation Center	$360,394	6	n/a
Transformation Waco	$325,000	3	42%
Waco Cultural Arts Fest	$320,000	2	19%
Waco Family YMCA	$317,475	4	2%
Meals on Wheels Waco	$300,273	7	4%
Communities in Schools of the Heart of Texas	$298,227	3	4%
Waco Civic Theatre	$274,480	4	19%
Greater Waco Legal Services	$250,000	2	30%
Texas Tribune Inc	$250,000	1	n/a
Family Abuse Center Inc	$249,491	6	4%
United Way of Waco-McLennan County	$240,000	3	6%
Talitha Koum Institute	$230,144	2	10%
Historic Waco Foundation Inc	$229,600	4	51%
Cameron Park Zoological & Botanical Society	$225,000	1	7%
Animal Birth Control Clinic	$214,928	3	4%
World Hunger Relief Institute	$208,650	5	19%
The Cove - Heart of Texas Inc	$204,697	3	11%
Compassion Ministries of Waco	$199,000	3	13%
Hot Workforce Development Board Inc	$194,370	1	1%
Cen-Tex Hispanic Chamber of Comm	$179,500	1	51%
La Vega Isd	$177,573	1	n/a
Cenikor Foundation	$162,500	4	0%
City of Waco	$150,000	3	n/a
Mission Waco Mission World Inc	$150,000	1	2%
Caritas of Waco	$141,145	5	0%
Waco Symphony Association Inc	$134,520	3	11%
Waco Isd	$127,159	4	n/a
Methodist Children's Home	$113,056	1	0%
The Arc of McLennan County	$109,621	3	17%
Creative Waco	$107,000	4	10%
Texas Retired Teachers Residence Corp	$103,080	2	2%
Ascension Providence Foundation	$101,919	4	2%
Avance	$100,000	2	n/a
American National Red Cross & Its Constituent Chapters and Branches	$89,710	5	0%
Girl Scouts of Central Texas	$80,000	3	0%
Heart of Texas Goodwill Industries Inc	$77,622	2	0%
Texas Museums & Halls of Fame Foundation	$70,767	5	6%
Skillpoint Alliance	$65,000	1	n/a
City Center Waco Center Incubator	$60,000	1	15%
Carter BloodCare	$58,563	3	0%
Cen-Tex African American Chamber of Commerce Inc	$50,000	1	33%
Central Texas Food Bank Inc	$49,000	2	0%
Advocacy Center for Crime Victims and Children	$47,406	3	1%
Community Doulas of Waco	$47,000	1	n/a
Community Healthcare of Texas	$46,921	3	0%
Waco-McLennan County Public Health District	$42,000	1	n/a
Quinn Campus Inc	$40,000	1	n/a
McLennan County Dispute Resolution Center	$40,000	1	23%
Waco Chamber of Commerce Community Dev	$35,000	1	11%
Enrich Seniors	$26,500	1	n/a
Waco Downtown Farmers Market	$25,000	1	8%
Philanthropy Southwest	$25,000	1	1%
City of Beverly Hills	$24,058	1	n/a
WI Cook Foundation Inc	$23,450	2	0%
Viable Options in Community Endeavors VOICE	$19,600	1	1%
Waco Boys & Girls Club	$18,000	1	n/a
Cook Children's Medical Center	$17,000	1	0%
Community Cancer Association	$7,500	1	n/a
Heart of Texas Regional Advisory Council	$5,000	1	2%

Cooper Foundation supplied at least a quarter of the budget for 6 of its grantees at some point. The chart plots its 56 largest grantees; load-bearing ones sit top left.

Tap a dot to name the grantee.

How this is measured

Share of budget is the funder’s grant in a year over the grantee’s total revenue that year, at its highest across the years we hold; revenue is from all sources. Only grantees confirmed against their own filings, whose grants do not exceed their revenue, are plotted: the largest 56.

Nonprofits that may fit its grantmaking

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.

Waco FoundationTX86.1× affinity39 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Waco Foundation · Bernard & Audre Rapoport Foundation · United Way of Waco-McLennan County · Baylor University · Clifton Foundation · Margaret Cb & S Spencer N Brown Foundation Inc · Ascension Providence · The Fentress Foundation · Once Upon a Time Foundation · Bowen Family Foundation · The McClane Brown Family Foundation · Magnolia Foundation

How this is measured

Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

Compare Cooper Foundation with peer funders

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Cooper Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Cooper Foundation 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.

About Cooper Foundation

How much does Cooper Foundation give?: Cooper Foundation reported 24 grants totaling $2,106,251 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 19 and 25 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.
What does Cooper Foundation fund?: By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are Health (18%), Community Improvement (14%), Arts & Culture (13%).
Who are Cooper Foundation's largest grantees?: By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: Heart of Texas Community Health Center Inc ($1.0M), Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas Inc ($1.0M), Greater Waco Collective Impact Initiative ($980k).
Does Cooper Foundation fund new organizations?: In FY2024, 24% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
Which funders back the same organizations as Cooper Foundation?: Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Waco Foundation, Bernard & Audre Rapoport Foundation, United Way of Waco-McLennan County.
Where is Cooper Foundation based?: Cooper Foundation is based in TX.