Illinois · Nonprofit
SIT STAY READ INC
SIT STAY READ INC (Illinois) receives grants from 63 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,346,881 to it, the largest being DONLEY FOUNDATION-UD DTD 12-8-86 ($213,854). 27 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $429k
- Funders on record
- 63
- Grants received
- $1.3M
- Net assets
- $32k
What Sit Stay Read Inc does
Mission
To advance children's literacy skills using an engaging curriculum, certified dogs, and dedicated volunteers.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
The program provides literacy services to children from low-income households in chicago public schools at no cost to the parents or schools. The mission is to advance children's literacy skills using an engaging curriculum, certified dogs, and dedicated volunteers. During 2022-23, sitstayread's 20th year, with the help of 75 human and 25 canine volunteers, sitstay read served 1,847 students in 116 classrooms across 18 chicago public schools using three different remote learning programs developed for students in kindergarten through third grade. In addition to the remote learning curriculum, sitstayread provided more than 20,000 books to students during their pandemic learning year. Dogs enable the organization to tackle the serious issue of childhood literacy in a fun and engaging way. Ssr's defining characteristic is incorporating the therapeutic benefit of dogs in the classroom. Students who read out loud to a dog are less likely to feel worried about making mistakes, which helps them become more confident readers.
$279,447 spent100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $279,447.
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 2023 to 2024, from $265k to $117k (−56%).
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: 2021 27% · 2022 17%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
100% of SIT STAY READ INC’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (57% 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
Deirdre Harrison
Executive director
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2024 and FY2025 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 6 funders to 19 funders, grant income rose $67k → $160k.
10 of 63 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 28% 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 SIT STAY READ INC’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 63 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
SIT STAY READ INC has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 16% of grant income, and it takes 6 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 6 funders to its left
34% 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 SIT STAY READ INC.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 38% · 2018 37% · 2019 37% · 2020 18% · 2021 17% · 2022 14% · 2023 16% — 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
38% of SIT STAY READ INC's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 43% 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
64% of SIT STAY READ INC's grant income comes from Illinois funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $373k arriving through sponsors registered in 10 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
SIT STAY READ INC's funding base is broadening — from 6 funders to 19 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 17,450 education nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2025
Organizations like SIT STAY READ INC
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
56% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
96%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for SIT STAY READ INC: 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 SIT STAY READ INC?
- SIT STAY READ INC (Illinois) receives grants from 63 organizations whose IRS filings report $1,346,881 to it, the largest being DONLEY FOUNDATION-UD DTD 12-8-86 ($213,854). 27 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does SIT STAY READ INC have?
- IRS filings report 63 organizations giving $1,346,881 in grants to SIT STAY READ INC, 27 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of SIT STAY READ INC?
- DONLEY FOUNDATION-UD DTD 12-8-86 is the largest funder on record, with $213,854 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like SIT STAY READ INC 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.
Play a game about who funds Sit Stay Read →
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 63 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