How much does Zell Family Foundation give?

Zell Family Foundation reported 54 grants totaling $62,988,248 in its FY2024 IRS filing. It funded between 55 and 72 organizations a year over FY2020 to FY2023.

What does Zell Family Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2020 to FY2024, its largest causes are Education (38%), Health (35%), Arts & Culture (16%).

Who are Zell Family Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2020 to FY2024: University of Michigan ($86M), Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School ($28M), Rochelle Zell Jewish High School ($22M).

Does Zell Family Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2023, 25% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Does Zell 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 Zell Family Foundation?

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

Where is Zell Family Foundation based?

Zell Family Foundation is based in IL.

Foundation Dossiers

Illinois · Private foundation

Zell 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.

$63M
Granted FY2024(still arriving): 54
Grants FY2024: 55
Organizations funded FY2023: 25%
First-time grantees FY2023

Read the full brief

Median grant, FY2024: $160,000
Largest grant, FY2024: $25,000,000
Organizations funded a year: 55 to 72; FY2020 to FY2023
States reached, FY2024: 8
Total assets, FY2024: $120M
Applications: Preselected organizations only; Per its most recent filing; check its own site

How open it is to new grantees

In FY2023, 25% of the organizations Zell Family Foundation funded were first-time grantees, receiving 3% of its grant dollars.

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2023, 97% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $3.7M went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Arts & CultureEducationRecreation & SportsCivil RightsPhilanthropyInternationalOther

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 year	Organizations funded	To those organizations	First-time grantees
FY2024still arriving	47	$63M	9%
FY2023	55	$133M	25%
FY2022	72	$26M	38%
FY2021	65	$22M	46%
FY2020	60	$20M	n/a

99% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2020 to 2024.

Education$103MHealth$93MArts & Culture$42MCommunity Improvement$14MCivil Rights$5.0MInternational$3.2MYouth Development$3.0MPhilanthropy$2.2MOther$0

Where its grants go

Grant dollars by states, across the years we hold.

Which US states its grants reach

Top grantees

Largest recipients by total granted, FY2020 to FY2024, and the share of each one’s budget the grants supplied at peak.

Grantee	Total granted	Years	Share of their budget
University of Michigan	$86,124,000	5	57%
Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School	$28,000,000	4	10%
Rochelle Zell Jewish High School	$21,500,000	5	6%
Chicago Symphony Orchestra	$20,107,000	5	8%
University of Chicago	$9,231,733	5	0%
Zell Entrepreneurship Foundation	$6,000,000	5	10%
Steppenwolf Theatre Company	$4,590,000	5	12%
Chicago Public Education Fund	$3,400,000	5	28%
Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression Inc	$3,200,000	3	4%
Museum of Contemporary Art	$3,100,000	5	5%

Show all 91 grantees

All grantees of Zell Family Foundation by total granted
Grantee	Total granted	Years	Share of their budget
University of Michigan	$86,124,000	5	57%
Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School	$28,000,000	4	10%
Rochelle Zell Jewish High School	$21,500,000	5	6%
Chicago Symphony Orchestra	$20,107,000	5	8%
University of Chicago	$9,231,733	5	0%
Zell Entrepreneurship Foundation	$6,000,000	5	10%
Steppenwolf Theatre Company	$4,590,000	5	12%
Chicago Public Education Fund	$3,400,000	5	28%
Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression Inc	$3,200,000	3	4%
Museum of Contemporary Art	$3,100,000	5	5%
Start Early	$3,075,000	3	1%
Camp Ramah in Wisconsin Endowment Corp	$3,000,000	1	96%
Teach for America Inc	$2,808,334	5	0%
Birthright Israel Foundation	$2,200,000	5	1%
Imentor Inc	$2,100,000	5	4%
Jewish United Fund of Metropolitan Chicago	$1,650,000	3	0%
University of Colorado Foundation	$1,575,000	3	0%
Lincoln Park Conservancy	$1,250,000	1	50%
ChiArts Foundation	$1,245,000	3	22%
Teach for All Inc	$1,200,000	5	1%
American Friends of Reichman University Inc	$1,000,000	1	11%
Young Chicago Authors	$870,000	5	18%
A Better Chicago	$800,000	4	4%
The Point Magazine	$760,000	5	57%
The Boulder Jewish Community Center	$700,000	3	6%
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum	$625,000	3	0%
Facing History & Ourselves Inc	$550,000	4	1%
Hold on to Your Music Inc	$525,000	3	35%
Chicago Architecture Biennial Inc	$450,000	3	30%
The Chicago High School for the Arts	$415,000	1	4%
Chicago West Community Music Center	$400,000	4	17%
Merit School of Music	$375,000	5	3%
National Ramah Commission Inc	$344,000	4	2%
Classical Music Chicago	$320,000	4	15%
American Civil Liberties Union Foundation Inc	$300,000	2	0%
Northwestern University	$300,000	1	0%
Ann & Robert H Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago	$250,000	2	0%
Lyric Opera of Chicago	$250,000	1	0%
Chicago Children's Museum	$240,000	3	2%
Intrinsic Schools	$200,000	2	0%
The Joffrey Ballet	$200,000	2	0%
Chicago Public Library Foundation	$200,000	4	1%
Urban Gateways	$169,329	4	2%
Cellobello Inc	$150,000	1	46%
Jewish Theological Seminary of America	$150,000	3	n/a
Simon Wiesenthal Center Inc	$130,000	2	0%
Marwen Foundation Inc	$120,000	1	6%
The Art Institute of Chicago	$105,000	5	0%
University of California San Francisco Foundation	$100,000	2	0%
Erikson Institute	$100,000	2	0%
Invest for Kids Inc	$80,000	3	2%
The Arts Club of Chicago	$75,000	1	3%
Cato Institute	$70,000	2	0%
Cedille Chicago Nfp	$65,000	2	3%
United States Artists Inc	$60,000	1	1%
Third Coast Percussion Nfp	$55,000	3	2%
Chicago Shakespeare Theater	$50,000	1	1%
American Symphony Orchestra League D/B/A League of American Orchestras	$50,000	2	1%
Music of the Baroque	$50,000	1	2%
Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras	$50,000	2	1%
American Jewish Committee	$50,000	1	0%
Center for American Entrepreneurship	$50,000	1	8%
Prostate Cancer Foundation	$50,000	1	0%
Millennium Park Foundation	$50,000	3	1%
Holocaust Memorial Foundation of Illinois Inc	$40,000	1	0%
Window to the World Communications Inc	$40,000	1	0%
After School Matters Inc	$35,000	2	0%
Hyde Park Art Center	$35,000	3	1%
Junior Economic Club of Chicago	$30,000	3	n/a
Academy for Urban School Leadership	$25,450	1	0%
The American Writers Museum	$25,000	1	1%
Music Institute of Chicago	$25,000	1	0%
Institute for Humane Studies	$25,000	3	0%
Onegoal	$25,000	1	0%
Federation of Jewish Communities of the Cis Inc	$25,000	1	0%
Rush University Medical Center	$25,000	1	0%
Insideout Literary Arts Project	$25,000	1	2%
The American Friends of Museums in Israel	$25,000	1	3%
Grant Park Orchestral Association	$25,000	3	0%
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research	$24,000	2	0%
Listen Foundation Inc	$20,000	1	5%
Ravinia Festival Association	$20,000	2	0%
Lincoln Park Zoological Society	$15,000	3	0%
Museum of Modern Art	$15,000	2	0%
Illinois Arts Alliance	$15,000	2	2%
The Chicago Council on Global Affairs	$15,000	1	0%
Michigan B'Nai B'Rith Hillel Foundation Inc	$10,000	1	0%
Sharsheret Inc	$10,000	1	0%
Junior Achievement of Chicago	$5,000	1	0%
THE SOLTI FOUNDATION US CO Fiona Queen	$3,500	1	1%
Institute for Justice	$2,000	1	0%

What it could do for these grantees

Plus 44 recipients with no EIN on record ($47M), not named here.

Zell Family Foundation supplied at least a quarter of the budget for 8 of its grantees at some point. The chart plots its 89 largest grantees; load-bearing ones sit top left.

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 89.

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.

Arie and Ida Crown MemorialIL37.3× affinity16 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Arie and Ida Crown Memorial · John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation · The Chicago Community Trust · Polk Bros Foundation Inc · The Irving Harris Foundation · Lloyd a Fry Foundation · Jewish Federation of Metropolitan Chicago · Circle of Service Foundation · Ncrc Community Development Fund Inc · Julian Family Foundation · The Bluhm Family Foundation · The Negaunee 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.

Compare Zell Family Foundation with peer funders

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Zell Family Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Zell 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 Zell Family Foundation

How much does Zell Family Foundation give?: Zell Family Foundation reported 54 grants totaling $62,988,248 in its FY2024 IRS filing. It funded between 55 and 72 organizations a year over FY2020 to FY2023.
What does Zell Family Foundation fund?: By grant dollars over FY2020 to FY2024, its largest causes are Education (38%), Health (35%), Arts & Culture (16%).
Who are Zell Family Foundation's largest grantees?: By total granted over FY2020 to FY2024: University of Michigan ($86M), Bernard Zell Anshe Emet Day School ($28M), Rochelle Zell Jewish High School ($22M).
Does Zell Family Foundation fund new organizations?: In FY2023, 25% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
Does Zell 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 Zell Family Foundation?: Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Arie and Ida Crown Memorial, John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation, The Chicago Community Trust.
Where is Zell Family Foundation based?: Zell Family Foundation is based in IL.