Illinois · Nonprofit
Storycatchers
Storycatchers (Illinois) receives grants from 66 organizations whose IRS filings report $5,435,650 to it, the largest being THE SIMON FAMILY FOUNDATION ($700,000). 49 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $333k
- Funders on record
- 66
- Grants received
- $5.4M
- Net assets
- $0
What Storycatchers does
Mission
Storycatchers guides young people to transform their traumatic experiences into powerful musical theatre, inspiring them to develop the courage and vision to become leaders and mentors. By creating support for youth within the criminal justice system, Storycatchers prepares them to change their lives and emerge successfully from court involvement.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
On its FY2024 return the organization reported a significant change in how it conducts a program.
The organization has dissolved and is not longer providing program services as of March 31, 2025.
Its own explanation, from Schedule O of that return (Part III, line 3).
The Organization offers two youth development programs: one that works inside three juvenile detention centers in or near Chicago with 13- to 18-year-olds, and Changing Voices, which employs 21 young people between the ages of 17 and 24 who are on parole, probation or post-release. Through Changing Voices, the young people receive wraparound services and work with both case managers and artist educators for 30 hours a week while being paid at Chicago's minimum wage.
$671,141 spentof which $36,600 as grants$87,458 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $671,141.
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.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2024 to 2025, from $1.1M to $0 (−100%).
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 6% · 2019 5% · 2020 7% · 2021 20% · 2022 10% · 2023 37% · 2024 45% · 2025 32%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 of the last 8 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.
Board chair
Kendra J Freeman
Chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 19 funders to 27 funders, grant income fell $1.1M → $510k.
8 of 66 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 20% 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 Storycatchers’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 66 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
Storycatchers has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 13% 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
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 48% · 2018 22% · 2019 41% · 2020 30% · 2021 18% · 2022 14% · 2023 20% — 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
51% of Storycatchers's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 74% 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
82% of Storycatchers's grant income comes from Illinois funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.1M arriving through sponsors registered in 7 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.
Organizations like Storycatchers
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
58% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
99%
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 Storycatchers: 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 Storycatchers?
- Storycatchers (Illinois) receives grants from 66 organizations whose IRS filings report $5,435,650 to it, the largest being THE SIMON FAMILY FOUNDATION ($700,000). 49 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Storycatchers have?
- IRS filings report 66 organizations giving $5,435,650 in grants to Storycatchers, 49 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Storycatchers?
- THE SIMON FAMILY FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $700,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Storycatchers 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 66 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 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing