Michigan · Nonprofit
CALVIN UNIVERSITY
CALVIN UNIVERSITY (Michigan) receives grants from 248 organizations whose IRS filings report $116,577,133 to it, the largest being LILLY ENDOWMENT INC ($64,475,111). 164 of them have funded it in more than one year.
Against its field
CALVIN UNIVERSITY's funding base is broadening — from 84 funders to 118 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 671 education nonprofits over $100M, FY2025
Three funders worth looking at
Grantmakers with no record of funding this organization, ranked by how strongly the co-funder graph and the mission embeddings agree. The evidence is in section 03.
- Cdv5 Foundationshared funders
- Berry Marie D Fd H Pfdnportfolio match
- Francis F Carnes Education Charitable Trustportfolio match
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2017 2% · 2018 2% · 2019 1% · 2021 5% · 2022 7% · 2023 5% · 2024 7% · 2025 2%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
15% of CALVIN UNIVERSITY’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (14% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 2 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 84 funders to 118 funders, grant income rose $9.4M → $9.6M.
49 of 248 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 26% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
Left out of every figure on this page: $6k from one payer (the same organization on both sides, largest Calvin University). These are real filings, and they are not money CALVIN UNIVERSITY raised.
From the IRS filings of CALVIN UNIVERSITY’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 248 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
CALVIN UNIVERSITY leans on a few funders — its largest provides 55% of grant income and the top three 71%; half comes from just 1 funder.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 1 funder to its left
31% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund CALVIN UNIVERSITY.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 30% · 2018 51% · 2019 45% · 2020 62% · 2021 16% · 2022 63% · 2023 42% — growing more concentrated.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
53% of CALVIN UNIVERSITY's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 66% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
CALVIN UNIVERSITY draws 85% of its grant income from funders outside Michigan, across 28 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $30M arriving through sponsors registered in 24 statesis excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Funders to approach
Grantmakers that don’t fund you yet, surfaced two ways: they back organizations that share your funders, or their grantees resemble your mission. The ones both signals agree on come first. Your 248 funders put you typical among the 400 organizations that share them.
- Cdv5 Foundationshared fundersMI · backs 55 organizations that share your funders
- Berry Marie D Fd H Pfdnportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Francis F Carnes Education Charitable Trustportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- The Alice Aber Smith Scholarship Fundportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Earnest F & Edna P Aber Scholarship Fundportfolio matchits grantees resemble your mission
- Hispanic Scholarship Fundshared fundersCA · backs 97 organizations that share your funders
- Ernest Wentcher Educational Fundshared fundersIL · backs 69 organizations that share your funders
- Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy Incshared fundersDC · backs 64 organizations that share your funders
- Heart of West Michigan United Wayshared funderslocalMI · backs 56 organizations that share your funders · funds 190 organizations near you
- Howard Hughes Medical Instituteshared fundersMD · backs 70 organizations that share your funders
- American Chemical Societyshared fundersDC · backs 114 organizations that share your funders
- The George Washington Universityshared fundersVA · backs 68 organizations that share your funders
From the co-funder graph (funders backing at least two comparable organizations, shrunk for grantee count, donor-advised and mega-funds excluded) and the universe embeddings. A research starting point; overlap is association, not a guarantee of fit.
Government funding CALVIN UNIVERSITY receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $23.4M on record.
- Department of Education$16.0M
- National Science Foundation$3.7M
- Department of the Interior$1.3M
- Department of Health and Human Services$946k
- Department of Defense$509k
- National Endowment for the Humanities$500k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like CALVIN UNIVERSITY
Nonprofits whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over the universe of US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Michigan
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
96% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
65%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 3 states
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for CALVIN UNIVERSITY: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds CALVIN UNIVERSITY?
- CALVIN UNIVERSITY (Michigan) receives grants from 248 organizations whose IRS filings report $116,577,133 to it, the largest being LILLY ENDOWMENT INC ($64,475,111). 164 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does CALVIN UNIVERSITY have?
- IRS filings report 248 organizations giving $116,577,133 in grants to CALVIN UNIVERSITY, 164 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of CALVIN UNIVERSITY?
- LILLY ENDOWMENT INC is the largest funder on record, with $64,475,111 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like CALVIN UNIVERSITY find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Michigan. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 248funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported August 27, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing