· Private foundation
Rydell Family 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 you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k7 grants · $9k
- $10k–50k5 grants · $84k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| United Way of Rock River Valley | $29,000 |
| St Mark Lutheran Church | $22,750 |
| Alpine Academy of Rockford | $12,000 |
| Christian Life Schools | $10,000 |
| Seventh Street Coffee Inc | $10,000 |
| Rosecrance Foundation | $5,000 |
| Rockford University | $2,500 |
| Rock Valley College Foundation | $1,000 |
| American Heart Association | $250 |
| Central Christian Church | $250 |
| Kids Around The World | $250 |
| Bethesda Covenant Church | $200 |
Do your dollars go where the need is?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, then read against the area’s typical level.
Your human-services grants (FY17–25, $21k) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 76% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty linein the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP; grantee ZIP can differ from where services are delivered.
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are actually delivered. Need from public data — U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.
Who you back again
Which organizations you funded more than once, and which you funded a single time. Each grantee is matched to its own filings.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +16% since the first grant, against 0% for the ones you funded once.
19 repeat relationships — 7 still active in FY2025, 12 since wound down; 5 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, 75% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $23k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
First-time = a grantee’s first year in your filing window; renewed = funded in an earlier year too. As a portfolio matures the renewed share naturally climbs — once funded, an org stays “renewable” — so the signal is the years that buck it (a new-grantee intake wave). 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
- RFROSECRANCE FOUNDATION INC5× · 2018–2025 · $26k · revenue +153%
- RUROCKFORD UNIVERSITY5× · 2018–2025 · $25k · revenue +16%
- RPROCKFORD PARK DISTRICT FOUNDATION2× · 2019–2021 · $16k · revenue +162%
Funded once
- TLTHE LINCOLN ACADEMY OF ILLINOISone grant, 2018 · $50k · revenue -7%
- UOUNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS COLLEGE OF MEDICINEone grant, 2022 · $10k
- IGIndividual grant recipientone grant, 2023 · $10k
Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.
The map has a center of gravity: the average direction from the rest of the sector toward the organizations the foundation funds — the shape of its giving. Scoring every nonprofit along that direction surfaces the ones that look most like the portfolio. These are the closest matchesthat aren’t grantees — a resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
Rock river valley blood center, in partnership with our community, is dedicated to providing safe, high value blood products and services to people in need.
To provide analysis and commentary on cultural, economic, political, and educational issues through a published monthly opinion magazine and to operate continuing adult educational conferences in american and european literature and…
It is the mission of this corporation to provide quality care for children between the ages of six weeks and twelve years whose parents are employed or in training.
To support housing and community development ventures
The rockford area economic development council cultivates opportunities for primary job growth that increase the economic well-being of our region
Rockford regional health council is a not-for-profit social service corporation organized under the laws of the state of illinois for the purpose of improving community health through data gatering and analysis, education and advocacy.
Our purpose is to provide financial services to our members with competitive rates while maintaining our financial stability.
Preservation of swedish historical structure, culture and artifacts through the operations of a museum and cultural center.
To advocate on behalf of those in need of decent shelter by building and renovating affordable houses.
Rockford area community endowment is a local foundation committed to assisting rockford area residents, businesses, government and volunteer organizations to expand opportunities locally. race was founded in 1964.
The organization provides low income affordable housing under illinois housing development authority guidelines.
The mission of the racine zoological society is to foster an enlightening and affordable wildlife experience that improves the bond between people and nature. the society will provide for the recreation and education of the people, the…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Rockford Rescue Mission Ministries and the most unlike its peers is Life Decisions Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
Your grantees are a median of 38 years old; the field is 18. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 20% startups (under 5 years old) — 0% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 15% of the field you don’t fund.
Age = years since IRS exemption (a founding proxy). “Closed” = auto-revocation for 3 years of non-filing — a floor on closure, not proof, and bigger established orgs lapse least. Association, not causation.
35 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.
Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue from every source. Association, dated; never a causal claim.
Counted here: distinct organizations you funded across 2017–2025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 35 of the 78 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile; the rest are funded organizations whose filings we could not track year by year.
Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee
Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing
Go grantee by grantee — a decade per org, and how each moved after you funded them
A decade per grantee — revenue shaded, your grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
- Who funds UNITED WAY OF ROCK RIVER VALLEY ↗
- Who funds THE LINCOLN ACADEMY OF ILLINOIS ↗
- Who funds ROSECRANCE FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds ROCKFORD UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds ROCKFORD PARK DISTRICT FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds ROCKFORD RESCUE MISSION MINISTRIES ↗
- Who funds LIFE DECISIONS INC ↗
- Who funds SwedishAmerican Health Foundation ↗
- Who funds SEVENTH STREET COFFEE INC ↗
- Who funds KIDS AROUND THE WORLD INC ↗
- Who funds BRAVEHEARTS THERAPEUTIC RIDING AND EDUCATIONAL CENTER ↗
- Who funds ROCKFORD SYMPHONY ORCHESTRAS INC ↗
- Who funds Geneva Lake Water Safety Committee Inc ↗
- Who funds ROCKFORD PUBLIC LIBRARY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds CARPENTER'S PLACE INC ↗
- Who funds LUTHERAN SOCIAL SERVICES OF ILLINOIS ↗
- Who funds LAURENT HOUSE FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds MIDWAY VILLAGE & MUSEUM CENTER ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF ROCKFORD POLICE K9 UNIT ↗
The grantmakers whose grantees overlap with yours far more than size alone predicts. Each orbits closer the stronger the alignment; the arcs between them show where they also fund each other. Here it reads as a tightly interlocked camp — most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: Community Foundation of Northern IL · Bergstrom Inc Charitable Foundation Xxxxx2008 · The Kjellstrom Family Foundation · Blazer Foundation · Tracy E Anderson Charitable Foundation · The David & Colleen Anderson Charitable Foundation · Kristin L Anderson Charitable Foundation · John & Linda Anderson Charitable Foundation · Jeffrey R Anderson Charitable Foundation · John T Wolf Charitable Trust II · Guy Reno Family Foundation · United Way of Rock River Valley
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. A research starting point: overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Rydell Family Foundation funds. Left–right is the share of its income from government; up–down is the share from you. Bigger dots raise more. Filter to federal or a single department — and drag the year to watch it move.
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 your grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first — a floor, not 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 12–24 months.