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Foundation Dossiers

Iowa · Private foundation

Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust

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.

$26k
Granted FY2025(still arriving)
9
Grants FY2025
9
Organizations funded FY2024
22%
First-time grantees FY2024
Read the full brief
Median grant, FY2025
$1,500
Largest grant, FY2025
$10,500
Organizations funded a year
1 to 17
FY2018 to FY2024
States reached, FY2025
2
Total assets, FY2025
$818k
Applications
Preselected organizations only
Per its most recent filing; check its own site

How open it is to new grantees

In FY2024, 22% of the organizations Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust funded were first-time grantees, receiving 14% of its grant dollars.

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 86% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $4k went to new ones.

50%100%’18’19’20’21’22’23’24
RenewedFirst-time

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

’18’19’20’21’22’23’24
EducationOther
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 yearOrganizations fundedTo those organizationsFirst-time grantees
FY2025still arriving9$26k33%
FY20249$26k22%
FY202317$32k47%
FY202213$15k100%
FY20211$17k100%
FY20201$53k100%
FY20191$77k100%
FY20181$44k100%
100% classified

What it funded, over time

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

Education$340k

Top grantees

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

GranteeTotal grantedYearsShare of their budget
Buena Vista University$6,40030%
Northwestern College$3,70020%
Morningside University$3,00020%
Upper Iowa University$1,50010%
Simpson College$1,50020%
Drake University$1,50020%
Wartburg College$1,10010%
Concordia University$1,10010%
Briar Cliff University$40010%

Plus 22 recipients with no EIN on record ($320k), not named here.

Where it is load-bearing

Each grantee by its size and the share of its budget Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust supplied at peak.

25%50%75%100%$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetBuena Vista University: $6,400 over 3y, 0.0% of budgetNorthwestern College: $3,700 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetMorningside University: $3,000 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetUpper Iowa University: $1,500 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetSimpson College: $1,500 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetDrake University: $1,500 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetWartburg College: $1,100 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetConcordia University: $1,100 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetBriar Cliff University: $400 over 1y, 0.0% of budget

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 9.

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.

Bernice E Peterson Sc…Louis J Elbert TrustRoy J Carver Charitab…United Way WorldwidePaul & Mary Collins T…Willard E and Ella P …Fahrney Education Fdt…Bestenlehner D and F …Marguerite V BrownLa Amundson Ohana Fou…Pella Rolscreen Found…Mahana-Cong Church Sc…
Bernice E Peterson Scholarship TrustIA20× affinity7 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Bernice E Peterson Scholarship Trust · Louis J Elbert Trust · Roy J Carver Charitable Trust · United Way Worldwide · Paul & Mary Collins Trust · Willard E and Ella P Thompson Educational Fund · Fahrney Education Fdtn Trust · Bestenlehner D and F Educational Tr · Marguerite V Brown · La Amundson Ohana Foundation · Pella Rolscreen Foundation · Mahana-Cong Church Scholar Found

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 Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust with peer funders

About Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust

How much does Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust give?
Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust reported 9 grants totaling $25,500 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 1 and 17 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.
What does Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust fund?
By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are Education (100%).
Who are Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust's largest grantees?
By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: Buena Vista University ($6k), Northwestern College ($4k), Morningside University ($3k).
Does Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust fund new organizations?
In FY2024, 22% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
Does Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust accept unsolicited applications?
Its most recent filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and does not take unsolicited requests. Check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
Which funders back the same organizations as Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust?
Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Bernice E Peterson Scholarship Trust, Louis J Elbert Trust, Roy J Carver Charitable Trust.
Where is Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust based?
Joseph J Sinek Scholarship Trust is based in IA.

On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 31 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

How this is measured
Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its 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.

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

Source object · view filing

Play a game based on Joseph J Sinek Scholarship’s filings →

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 endowment market
who holds foundation money, and what just moved
The camps
funders cluster by geography, not ideology
By state
where grant money is based, and what stays home