Grants

Grant Recipient

Chicago Learning Exchange

Awarded: December 2022 Awarded Amount: $100,000

The Chicago Learning Exchange (CLX) will serve as the backbone intermediary for Chicago’s youth mentorship network in order to develop and coordinate strategies to better serve youth in Chicago. More specifically, through multiple programs and events, CLX will improve the quality, connections, and capacity of OST mentors and organizations to provide experiential, culturally relevant, asset-oriented, and meaningful youth learning and work opportunities. With the guiding belief that those closest to the problems should lead the solutions, we aim to revamp the current strategy for youth development programming at a community level to one that allows the city’s opportunities to permeate our most underserved areas and populations.

Grant Recipient

Catchafire, Inc.

Awarded: December 2022 Awarded Amount: $150,000

Since September 2020, the Chicago Community Trust has supportedCatchafire Chicago, a program aimed at strengthening Chicago organizations with immediate, high-quality, responsive pro bono consulting through Catchafire’s innovative platform. Since launching the partnership, 146 nonprofits have received pro bono assistance on 555 unique needs, delivering a total impact into those organizations of $1,875,695 for a total return on investment of 3.4X. The most in demand advisory call needs have been tech systems, website, human resources, organizational strategy and marketing strategy. The most in demand project needs have been impact report graphic design, print materials design, marketing strategy, and Salesforce database customization.This grant aims to expand this support to Chicagoland nonprofits in order to provide an opportunity for more program teams to leverage the Trust’s Catchafire program on behalf of their grantees.

Grant Recipient

Michael Reese Health Trust

Awarded: December 2022 Awarded Amount: $100,000

Chicago Funders Together to End Homelessness (CFTEH) respectfully requests $100,000, for one year, from The Chicago Community Trust to support the Housing Justice Fund (HJF). The goal of this fund is to distribute $2 million over two years to support policy, advocacy, community organizing, and narrative change initiatives to advance housing justice. The fund will provide unrestricted grants to coalitions, alliances, partnerships, and other collaborative tables for at least two years, recognizing that policy change, narrative change, and political will-building take time and significant resources.

Grant Recipient

Reader Institute for Community Journalism Inc

Awarded: December 2022 Awarded Amount: $75,000

The Chicago Reader respectfully requests $75,000 in support of our mission to create and curate political and cultural coverage by and for Chicago, including highlighting underrepresented communities and stories. As the first free weekly newspaper in the U.S. and now a nonprofit organization, we aim to be a model for independent nonprofit media in our coverage, collaboration, corporate responsibility, and community partnership. Our editorial strategy is focused on community-driven journalism through which we engage in dialogue with communities to assess their needs and respond appropriately, and we support the local media ecosystem through our project, the Chicago Independent Media Alliance (CIMA).

Grant Recipient

Chicago Community Foundation

Awarded: December 2022 Awarded Amount: $500,000

Grant Recipient

Chicago Community Foundation

Awarded: December 2022 Awarded Amount: $150,000