· Private foundation
Stearns Family Charitable Fund
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, FY2017 to 2024.
Where the money goes
Grants by size, and the largest recipients.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k22 grants · $52k
- $10k–50k4 grants · $73k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $107k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY | $107,040 |
| NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY | $31,874 |
| FIELD MUSEUM | $16,000 |
| BOYS AND GIRLS CLUB OF CHICAGO | $15,250 |
| HILTON HEAD CHRISTIAN ACADEMY | $10,000 |
| GENEVA FOUNDATION OF PRES HOMES | $7,750 |
| BETTER GOVERNMENT ASSOCIATION | $6,000 |
| NORTH SHORE HOSPITAL FOUNDATION | $5,000 |
| NORTH LAWNDALE COLLEGE PREP | $5,000 |
| ACCELERATE INSTITUTE | $5,000 |
| ADVANCE ILLINOIS | $5,000 |
| NORTH SHORE COUNTRY DAY SCHOOL | $5,000 |
| CHICAGO JESUIT ACADEMY | $2,500 |
| LYNN UNIVERSITY | $2,500 |
| SKOKIE COUNTRY CLUB EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION | $1,250 |
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 (FY17–23, $48k) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 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
Who it funds again
Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.
Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +36% since the first grant, against +14% for those funded once.
44 repeat relationships: 24 still active in FY2025, 20 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, 97% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $6k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
How this is measured
Backed again, and grew
Northwestern University7× · 2017–2025 · $211k · revenue +41%- BABOYS AND GIRLS CLUBS OF CHICAGO7× · 2017–2025 · $132k · revenue +39%
- HHHILTON HEAD CHRISTIAN ACADEMY6× · 2020–2025 · $85k · revenue +48%
Funded once
- TCTHE CHICAGO CLUB PRESERVATION FOUNDATIONone grant, 2020 · $10k · revenue -95%
- NANORTHWESTERN ANNUAL FUNDone grant, 2021 · $10k
- LCLEE CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOLone grant, 2018 · $6k
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.
We provide exemplary interdisciplinary programs for a community of scholar-practitioners within a distributed learning model grounded in student-driven inquiry and leading to enhanced knowledge.
The bac is committed to provide excellence in design education grounded in practice and accessible to diverse communities.
Saint xavier university, a catholic institution inspired by the heritage of the sisters of mercy, educates persons to search for truth, think critically, communicate effectively and serve wisely and compassionately in support of human…
The primary mission of furman as a liberal arts institution is to provide a distinctive education in fine arts, humanities, social sciences, mathematics and the sciences, as well as selected professional disciplines.
Illinois college is a co-educational institution of higher education learning providing a four-year educational program leading to the baccalaureate degree. illinois college is a community committed to the highest standards of scholarship…
Provide post-secondary education leading to a baccalaureate degree. Program service expenditures are made in conjunction with the operation of a liberal arts college spread over 107 acres with approximately 63 educational and support…
The University of New Haven is a student-centered comprehensive university with an emphasis on excellence in liberal arts and professional education. Our mission is to prepare our students to lead purposeful and fulfilling lives in a…
Lake forest academy strives to embody in its practices - and to cultivate in its students -excellence of character, scholarship, citizenship, and responsibility.
The university's goal in the coming decade is to advance learning through the integration of teaching, research and service to others. the core of this goal is to prepare graduates to engage with the world and lead lives of meaning. to do…
To Prepare Students for Success in Four-Year Colleges.
Lake Forest Graduate School of Management's mission is to bring the real world to business education and leadership development.
How this is measured
48 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. 48 of the 85 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 FIELD MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY ↗
- Who funds Northwestern University ↗
- Who funds BOYS AND GIRLS CLUBS OF CHICAGO ↗
- Who funds HILTON HEAD CHRISTIAN ACADEMY ↗
- Who funds NORTH SHORE COUNTRY DAY SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds NORTH LAWNDALE COLLEGE PREPARATORY CHARTER HIGH SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds CLEARBROOK ↗
- Who funds ADVANCE ILLINOIS NFP ↗
- Who funds Accelerate Institute ↗
- Who funds Endeavor Health Clinical Operations ↗
- Who funds THE JOFFREY BALLET ↗
- Who funds LYNN UNIVERSITY INC ↗
- Who funds Bethesda Hospital Foundation Inc ↗
- Who funds BETTER GOVERNMENT ASSOCIATION INC ↗
- Who funds Big Shoulders Fund ↗
- Who funds THE CHICAGO CLUB PRESERVATION FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago ↗
- Who funds ERIE ELEMENTARY CHARTER SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF THE ORPHANS D/B/A NPH-USA ↗
- Who funds THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds THE CIVIC FEDERATION ↗
- Who funds ALLENDALE ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds SKOKIE COUNTRY CLUB EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds CARLETON COLLEGE ↗
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 · Patrick G and Shirley W Ryan Foundation · Robert R McCormick Foundation · Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago · The Satter Foundation · Lavin Family Foundation · John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation · Frank Family Foundation · The Canning Foundation · The Robert Thomas Bobins Foundation · Lloyd a Fry Foundation · Polk Bros Foundation Inc
How this is measured
How much its grantees rely on government
Each dot is one organization Stearns Family Charitable Fund funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Stearns Family Charitable Fund. Bigger dots raise more.
- City Year Inc: 11% of income from government
- Florida Sheriffs Association Inc: 4% of income from government
- Lynn University Inc: 0% of income from government
- Caridad Center Inc: 0% of income from government
- Williams College: 0% of income from government
How this is measured
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Stearns Family Charitable Fund?
Find your warmest path to Stearns Family Charitable Fund 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 Stearns Family’s filings →