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Illinois · Private foundation

Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation

Its FY2024 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$455k
Granted FY2024(still arriving)
21
Grants FY2024
9
Organizations funded FY2023
33%
First-time grantees FY2023
Read the full brief
Median grant, FY2024
$10,000
Largest grant, FY2024
$172,500
Organizations funded a year
1 to 12
FY2017 to FY2023
States reached, FY2024
10
Total assets, FY2024
$6.3M
Applications
Preselected organizations only
Per its most recent filing; check its own site

How open it is to new grantees

In FY2023, 33% of the organizations Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation funded were first-time grantees, receiving 22% of its grant dollars.

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2023, 78% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $65k went to new ones.

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

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

’18’19’20’21’22’23
InternationalReligionPhilanthropyHuman ServicesHealthOther
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
FY2024still arriving20$435k60%
FY20239$299k33%
FY20221$10k100%
FY20211$86k0%
FY20206$118k50%
FY20196$360k0%
FY201810$332k30%
FY201712$309kn/a
100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2024.

International$1.6MPhilanthropy$241kPublic Benefit$60kScience & Tech$34kArts & Culture$25kEducation$20kHealth$18kReligion$18kOther$0

Where its grants go

Grant dollars by states, across the years we hold.

Which US states its grants reach

IL
NY
MA
PA
CA
CO
VA
DE
DC
GA

Top grantees

Largest recipients by total granted, FY2017 to FY2024, and the share of each one’s budget the grants supplied at peak.

Show all 30 grantees

What it could do for these grantees

Plus 4 recipients with no EIN on record ($47k), not named here.

Where it is load-bearing

Each grantee by its size and the share of its budget Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation supplied at peak.

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetWashington Institute for Near East Policy: $813,000 over 7y, 1.1% of budgetFriends of Elnet: $200,000 over 4y, 0.8% of budgetJewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago: $145,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetCentral Fund of Israel: $125,000 over 6y, 0.1% of budgetIsrael Emergency Alliance: $118,000 over 5y, 0.3% of budgetAmerican Israel Education Foundation Inc: $100,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetCenter for Entrepreneurial Jewish Philanthropy Inc: $90,000 over 5y, 3.4% of budgetThe Israel Project: $70,000 over 2y, 0.7% of budgetJumpstart Labs Inc DBA Jewish JUMPSTART JSLABS: $60,000 over 3y, 2.8% of budgetAmerican Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science Inc: $30,000 over 3y, 0.0% of budgetFoundation for the Defense of Democracies Inc: $20,000 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetChicago Coalition to End Homelessness: $14,130 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetBraver AngelsInc: $14,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetChef Ann Foundation: $14,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetStephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation: $10,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetHeterodox Academy: $10,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetProject Kesher: $10,000 over 1y, 0.4% of budgetThe Ember Foundation: $7,000 over 1y, 1.4% of budgetJewish Funders Network: $5,073 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetInvestigative Project on Terrorism Foundation: $5,000 over 1y, 0.2% of budgetAspiritech Nfp: $5,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetJoy as Resistance: $4,000 over 1y, 0.5% of budgetInstitute for Therapy Through the Arts: $4,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetIsrael Guide Dog Center for the Blind: $4,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetConservation International Foundation: $4,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetWorld Central Kitchen Inc: $4,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetAi for Good Foundation: $4,000 over 1y, 0.4% of budgetNational Multiple Sclerosis Society: $1,863 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 28.

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.

Jewish Federation of Metropolitan ChicagoIL17.4× affinity6 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago · Fjc · Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles · Jewish Communal Fund · The Chicago Community Trust · Gs Donor Advised Philanthropy Fund for Wealth Management Inc · National Philanthropic Trust · American Endowment Foundation · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · American Online Giving Foundation Inc

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 Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation with peer funders

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family 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 Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation

How much does Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation give?
Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation reported 21 grants totaling $455,210 in its FY2024 IRS filing. It funded between 1 and 12 organizations a year over FY2017 to FY2023.
What does Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation fund?
By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2024, its largest causes are International (76%), Philanthropy (12%), Public Benefit (3%).
Who are Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation's largest grantees?
By total granted over FY2017 to FY2024: Washington Institute for Near East Policy ($813k), Friends of Elnet ($200k), Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago ($145k).
Does Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation fund new organizations?
In FY2023, 33% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
Does Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation 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 Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation?
Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago, Fjc, Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles.
Where is Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation based?
Nathan and Esther K Wagner Family Foundation is based in IL.

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 36 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 2024, released 2024. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

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