Minnesota · Nonprofit
THE REEL HOPE PROJECT
THE REEL HOPE PROJECT (Minnesota) receives grants from 41 organizations whose IRS filings report $931,365 to it, the largest being THRIVENT CHARITABLE IMPACT & INVESTING ($186,700). 21 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 62% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2025
- $1.1M
- Funders on record
- 41
- Grants received
- $931k
- Net assets
- $764k
What The Reel Hope Project does
Mission
A forever family for every child.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
The organization creates adoption recruitment profile videos that highlight a child's story and helps to find their adoptive home. The organization works at the state department and private agency level across the country to provide this resource to children and teenagers waiting in foster care. The organization filmed 163 kid reels/videos during 2025. The organization received 519 family inquiries.
$782,501 spent$3,304 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2025 Form 990. Program spending in total: $782,501.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2020, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2020, 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 $278k to $636k (+129%).
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: 2020 0% · 2021 2% · 2023 3%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
105% of THE REEL HOPE PROJECT’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (82% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 6 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
Kaycee Stanley
CEO and founder
Board chair
John Walt
Board chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2018 → 2023: the base broadened from 1 funder to 15 funders, grant income rose $2k → $178k.
13 of 41 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 62% 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 THE REEL HOPE PROJECT’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 41 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
THE REEL HOPE PROJECT has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 20% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
66% 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 THE REEL HOPE PROJECT.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2018 100% · 2019 85% · 2020 28% · 2021 30% · 2022 44% · 2023 28% — 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
36% of THE REEL HOPE PROJECT's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 51% 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
62% of THE REEL HOPE PROJECT's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $350k that is directly attributable, 83% of it comes from Minnesota funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $582k 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
THE REEL HOPE PROJECT has grown faster than three-quarters of the 1,152 youth development nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,152 youth development nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Organizations like THE REEL HOPE PROJECT
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 Minnesota
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
72% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
98%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 6 states
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for THE REEL HOPE PROJECT: 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 THE REEL HOPE PROJECT?
- THE REEL HOPE PROJECT (Minnesota) receives grants from 41 organizations whose IRS filings report $931,365 to it, the largest being THRIVENT CHARITABLE IMPACT & INVESTING ($186,700). 21 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 62% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does THE REEL HOPE PROJECT have?
- IRS filings report 41 organizations giving $931,365 in grants to THE REEL HOPE PROJECT, 21 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of THE REEL HOPE PROJECT?
- THRIVENT CHARITABLE IMPACT & INVESTING is the largest funder on record, with $186,700 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like THE REEL HOPE PROJECT find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Minnesota. 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 Reel Hope Project →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2020–2025), and the filings of 41 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