Illinois · Nonprofit
Columbia College Chicago
Columbia College Chicago (Illinois) receives grants from 129 organizations whose IRS filings report $8,889,822 to it, the largest being TRAVIS FOUNDATION ($1,618,516). 61 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $268M
- Funders on record
- 129
- Grants received
- $8.9M
- Net assets
- $287M
What Columbia College Chicago does
Mission
The organization's mission is to educate students for creative occupations in diverse fields of arts and media.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Columbia College Chicago (the college) is a fully accredited not-for-profit private college with more than 40 academic programs and over 4,400 students. Columbia College Chicago awards undergraduate bachelor of arts, bachelor of fine arts, bachelor of music and bachelor of science degrees, along with graduate master of arts, master of arts management, and master of fine art degrees. The college is one of the largest and most diverse private arts and media colleges in the nation. The college's intent is to educate students who will communicate creatively and shape the public perceptions of issues and events and who will author the culture of their times. The college had 4,346 students enrolled in its undergraduate programs and 115 students enrolled in its graduate programs. The undergraduate programs are offered in eight schools within the college; the school of audio and music; the school of business and entrepreneurship; the school of communication and culture; the school of design; the school of fashion; the school of film and television; the school of theatre and dance; and the school of visual arts. In fall 2025, the school of audio and music had an undergraduate enrollment of…
$168,797,724 spentof which $70,439,050 as grants$172,681,495 earned by the program85% of program spendingColumbia College Chicago provides housing, food service, and residence life programs to its students. The college has over 2,000 beds available to its students in four different residence centers on its campus.
$30,322,136 spent$27,427,668 earned by the program15% of program spending
The 2 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $199,119,860.
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.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2020 to 2021, from $523M to $667M (+28%).
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 1% · 2018 1% · 2019 1% · 2020 4% · 2021 6% · 2022 6% · 2023 3% · 2024 0% · 2025 1%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
2% of Columbia College Chicago’s revenue is contributions — more earned-revenue than three-quarters of its peers (14% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 5 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Chief executive
Shantay Bolton
President and CEO, trustee, ex-officio-partial year
Board chair
John Mclain Holmes
Chairman of the board
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 21 funders to 43 funders, grant income fell $1.3M → $1.2M.
18 of 129 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 39% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of Columbia College Chicago’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 129 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
Columbia College Chicago has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 18% of grant income, and it takes 5 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 5 funders to its left
48% 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 Columbia College Chicago.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 78% · 2018 23% · 2019 20% · 2020 34% · 2021 32% · 2022 39% · 2023 26% — diversifying over time.
“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
20% of Columbia College Chicago's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 47% 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
Columbia College Chicago draws 66% of its grant income from funders outside Illinois, across 27 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $3.5M arriving through sponsors registered in 12 states is 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.
Against its field
Columbia College Chicago runs a healthier operating margin than half of the 684 education nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 684 education nonprofits over $100M, FY2025
Government funding Columbia College Chicago receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $39.0M on record — $38.9M federal, $119k state.
- Department of Education$38.2M
- National Endowment for the Arts$295k
- Institute of Museum and Library Services$250k
- National Science Foundation$187k
- FEDERAL$119k
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 Columbia College Chicago
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Illinois
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
82% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
75%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 2 states
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for Columbia College Chicago: 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. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds Columbia College Chicago?
- Columbia College Chicago (Illinois) receives grants from 129 organizations whose IRS filings report $8,889,822 to it, the largest being TRAVIS FOUNDATION ($1,618,516). 61 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Columbia College Chicago have?
- IRS filings report 129 organizations giving $8,889,822 in grants to Columbia College Chicago, 61 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Columbia College Chicago?
- TRAVIS FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $1,618,516 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Columbia College Chicago find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Illinois. 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 129 funders 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 October 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing