· Private foundation
Irish Woods Foundation
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.
What it funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2019 to 2025.
Where the money goes
Grants by size, and the largest recipients.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k33 grants · $117k
- $10k–50k16 grants · $333k
- $50k–250k5 grants · $505k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| LA LUMIERE SCHOOL | $200,000 |
| CYSTIC FIBROSIS FOUNDATION | $130,000 |
| CHICAGO JESUIT ACADEMY | $75,000 |
| LURIE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL | $50,000 |
| BLOCK CLUB CHICAGO | $50,000 |
| REBUILDING TOGETHER METRO CHICAGO | $40,000 |
| MISERCORDIA FOUNDATION | $40,000 |
| ST BENEDICT SCHOOL ANNUAL FUND | $35,000 |
| ST IGNATIUS COLLEGE PREP | $30,000 |
| AFTER SCHOOL MATTERS | $30,000 |
| SHARE FOUNDATION WITH THE HANDICAPPED | $25,000 |
| ST GILES SCHOOL | $20,000 |
| WOLCOTT COLLEGE PREP | $20,000 |
| THE GREATER CHICAGO FOOD DEPOSITORY | $15,000 |
| MERCY HOME FOR BOYS AND GIRLS | $13,000 |
Does the money reach high-need areas?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.
Its human-services grants (FY19–25, $190k) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 100% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
How this is measured
Which US states its grants reach
How this is measured
Where the work is directed
The same grants placed two ways: where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose sends the money.
About 100% of Irish Woods Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked for a different county than the recipient’s own address. By recipient address, 65% of the giving stays in IL; by stated purpose, 0%.
How this is measured
Who it funds again
Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.
Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +30% since the first grant, against +3% for those funded once.
75 repeat relationships: 52 still active in FY2025, 23 since wound down; 2 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (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 FY2025, 98% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $15k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
How this is measured
Backed again, and grew
- RTREBUILDING TOGETHER METRO CHICAGO7× · 2019–2025 · $270k · revenue +249%
- ASAFTER SCHOOL MATTERS INC7× · 2019–2025 · $205k · revenue +22%
- SFSHARE FOUNDATION WITH THE HANDICAPPED INC7× · 2019–2025 · $170k · revenue +53%
Funded once
- FCFXW CHILDREN AT THE CROSSROADSone grant, 2019 · $20k
- IGIndividual grant recipientone grant, 2020 · $17k
- MSMARILLAC ST VINCENT FAMILY SERVICES INCone grant, 2021 · $15k · revenue +3%
How this is measured
Repeat means funded in two or more distinct years. Growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.
Closest unfunded matches
The nonprofits that most resemble its grantees but are not funded by it, scored along the direction from the rest of the field toward the portfolio. A resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
The chicago public education fund (the fund) is a nonprofit organization that improves public schools in chicago by investing in the talented educators who lead them.
A better chicago is changing how chicago fights poverty by investing in bold ideas that create opportunity for our youth.
Chicago sun-times serves the public interest by strengthening the well-being of our local communities and our democracy through independent local journalism.
To spark curiosity and creativity in all young children through positive, play-based learning experiences.
The chicago psychoanalytic institute transforms the lives of individuals, families and communities, using psychoanalytic knowledge to help them grow and thrive.
To Prepare Students for Success in Four-Year Colleges.
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.
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…
Uchicago medicine network, inc. supports and encourages health and human service by providing support, directly or indirectly to ingalls memorial hospital, the university of chicago medical center, and other related tax-exempt…
To give members the ability to control their financial destiny by providing members with the means to satisfy their needs for financial services in a comfortable family-like environment. in doing so, the credit union strives to maintain…
The chicago bar foundation brings the legal community together through advocacy, funding, and innovation to improve access to justice for people in need and to make the legal system more fair, equitable, and effective.
Provide pediatric and subspecialty surgical, research, and educational services.
How this is measured
44 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.
Each grant beside the grantee’s revenue from every source, year by year.
How this is measured
Counted here: distinct organizations funded across 2017 to 2025, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 44 of the 87 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile.
Each grantee is resolved to its own IRS returns. Association, dated; never a causal claim.
Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee
Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing
Grantee by grantee: a decade per organization, before and after funding
A decade per grantee: revenue shaded, grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
- Who funds LA LUMIERE SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds CYSTIC FIBROSIS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds REBUILDING TOGETHER METRO CHICAGO ↗
- Who funds AFTER SCHOOL MATTERS INC ↗
- Who funds SHARE FOUNDATION WITH THE HANDICAPPED INC ↗
- Who funds BEYOND HUNGER ↗
- Who funds GREATER CHICAGO FOOD DEPOSITORY ↗
- Who funds ANTHONY RIZZO FAMILY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds SPECIAL OLYMPICS ILLINOIS ↗
- Who funds BLOCK CLUB CHICAGO NFP ↗
- Who funds Citizens United for Research in Epilepsy ↗
- Who funds MISERICORDIA FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds PANDAS NETWORKORG ↗
- Who funds HOUSING FORWARD ↗
- Who funds WESTERN RESERVE ACADEMY ↗
- Who funds SHEDD AQUARIUM SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds LINCOLN PARK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds Kenneth C Griffin Museum of Science and Industry ↗
- Who funds THE ADLER PLANETARIUM ↗
- Who funds NEW MOMS INC ↗
- Who funds SARAH'S INN ↗
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.
Open a dossier: The Chicago Community Trust · AbbVie Foundation · John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation · Dr Scholl Foundation · Jpmorgan Chase Foundation · Joseph R & Helen Shaker Family Foundation · Good Heart Work Smart Foundation · Oak Park-River Forest Community Foundation · Motorola Solutions Foundation · Baxter International Foundation · Usg Foundation Inc · United Way of Metropolitan Chicago Inc
How this is measured
How much its grantees rely on government
Each dot is one organization Irish Woods Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Irish Woods Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.
How this is measured
Play a game based on Irish Woods’ filings →