How much does Robert Galvin Foundation give?

Robert Galvin Foundation reported 27 grants totaling $3,819,150 in its FY2024 IRS filing. It funded between 29 and 79 organizations a year over FY2017 to FY2023.

What does Robert Galvin Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2024, its largest causes are Science & Tech (31%), Health (19%), Arts & Culture (13%).

Who are Robert Galvin Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2017 to FY2024: Rare ($1.8M), Vail Health Services Foundation ($1.6M), Santa Fe Institute ($1.0M).

Does Robert Galvin Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2023, 10% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Does Robert Galvin 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 Robert Galvin Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Paul Galvin Memorial Foundation Trust, John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation, The Chicago Community Trust.

Where is Robert Galvin Foundation based?

Robert Galvin Foundation is based in IL.

Robert Galvin Foundation

Robert Galvin Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Robert Galvin 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.

$3.8M

Granted FY2024still arriving

Grants FY2024still arriving

States reached

$1.3M

Largest

01What it funds

0199% classified

What it funded, over time

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

Science & Tech$9.2MHealth$5.7MArts & Culture$3.9MEnvironment$2.8MPhilanthropy$2.0MEducation$1.4MAnimals$975kInternational$924kOther$0

02FY2024 · 27 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2024

Under $10k3 grants · $14k
$10k–50k5 grants · $105k
$50k–250k14 grants · $1.4M
$250k+5 grants · $2.4M

$100,000

Median grant

States reached

$58M

Total assets

Largest grants
Recipient	Amount
INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY	$1,275,000
RARE	$300,000
INTERNATIONAL RESCUE COMMITTEE	$275,000
THEODORE ROOSEVELT CONSERVATION	$250,000
DEVELOPMENT	$250,000
KIDSPACE MUSEUM	$200,000
SANTA FE INSTITUTE	$150,000
WEITZMAN INSTITUTE OF SCIENCE	$100,000
BONEFISH & TARPON TRUST	$100,000
MAX MCGRAW WILDLIFE FOUNDATION	$100,000
INSTITUTE FOR ACHIEVEMENT OF HUMAN POTENTIAL	$100,000
UCSF SCHOOL OF MEDICINE	$100,000
MUSEUM OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY	$100,000
NATIONAL ACADEMY OF ENGINEERING	$100,000
ATLANTIC SALMON FEDERATION	$100,000

02The need

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Its human-services grants (FY17–21, $176k) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 100% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

How this is measured

Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.

Which US states its grants reach

How this is measured

US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.

03Its grantees

repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

90%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.

$26M · 91 repeat orgs$2.9M to everyone else

91 repeat relationships: 21 still active in FY2024, 70 since wound down; 5 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$26M

$2.2M

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+33%

+40%

Still filing today

60%

30%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 83% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $657k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Arts & CultureHuman ServicesInternationalHealthEducationAnimalsOther

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.

Backed again, and grew

R
RARE
7× · 2017–2024 · $1.8M · revenue +30%
VH
VAIL HEALTH SERVICES FOUNDATION
2× · 2017–2018 · $1.6M · revenue +210% · 32% of their budget
SANTA FE INSTITUTE
6× · 2018–2024 · $1.0M · revenue +348%

Funded once

HH
HUNTINGTON HOSPITAL - PASADENA
one grant, 2020 · $300k
EV
EAGLE VALLEY MENTAL HEALTH
one grant, 2020 · $300k · revenue +23%
NF
NORTHSHORE FOUNDATION
one grant, 2022 · $200k

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.

04Its field

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.

United States Naval Institute

Provide an independent forum for those who dare to read, think, speak, and write to advance the professional, literary, and scientific understanding of sea power and other issues critical to global security.

—

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

The mission of mit is to advance knowledge and educate students in science, technology, and other areas of scholarship that will best serve the nation and the world in the 21st century.

Education

American Association for the Advancement of Science

Advance science, engineering, and innovation throughout the world for the benefit of all. the world's largest multidisciplinary scientific society and a leading publisher of cutting-edge research through its science family of journals,…

Science & Tech

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

The Rand Corporation

Help improve policy and decision making through research and analysis.

Public Benefit

Boston Architectural College

The bac is committed to provide excellence in design education grounded in practice and accessible to diverse communities.

—

Columbia College Chicago

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

Education

National Opinion Research Center

See schedule onorc at the university of chicago conducts research and data science on critical societal issues to guide decision-making and the development of programs and public policy. our experts identify relationships and trends, and…

Social Science

Trustees of Tufts College

Education and Research

Education

The Trustees of Princeton University

Research, education and general - princeton university is a private not-for-profit, non-sectarian institution of higher learning with approximately 5,700 undergraduate and 3,300 graduate students. 2,500 students graduated in the 2024-2025…

Education

Vanderbilt University

See Disclosure Above.

Education

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

How this is measured

The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is The Chicago Lighthouse for People Who Are Blind Or Visually Impaired; the most unlike its peers is Max McGraw Wildlife Foundation. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

04the grantee network

71 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. 71 of the 130 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.

Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)

Early backer (in before they grew)

71/71

Grantees still filing

51/71

Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Other$18,274,165Health$3,409,000Arts & Culture$2,460,200Environment$1,788,500Animals$1,475,000International$1,095,000Science & Tech$1,025,000

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.

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.

Paul Galvin Memorial Foundation TrustIL43.3× affinity18 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Paul Galvin Memorial Foundation Trust · John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation · The Chicago Community Trust · The Ayco Charitable Foundation · The Robert Thomas Bobins Foundation · United Way of Metropolitan Chicago Inc · Baird Foundation Inc · National Philanthropic Trust · Arthur J Gallagher Foundation · Gs Donor Advised Philanthropy Fund for Wealth Management Inc · AbbVie Foundation · Jpmorgan Chase 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.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization Robert Galvin Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Robert Galvin Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24’25

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

2get no government money at all

24report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)

0rely on government for over half their income

⤢ axis zoomed · 0–90%

typical government reliance, FY20–25

How this is measured

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 a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than 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 to 24 months.

05Through Plinth

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Robert Galvin Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Robert Galvin 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.

Play a game based on Robert Galvin’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