Whether you donate to an existing endowment or create your own, be assured that your passion is our purpose.
Support for charitable activities that benefit the people and places of northern Illinois. Over $1.4M is distributed each year through the Community Grants Program alone!
90+ Unique Scholarships, nearly $300K in awards, just ONE Application! Application open December 1 - February 1.
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In Youth We Trust (IYWT) is CFNIL's youth philanthropy program, teaching leadership, community engagement, and grantmaking to the next generation of community leaders! The IYWT Council will kickoff the 2020 - 2021 program year with a virtual kickoff meeting. High school aged students from Boone, Ogle, Stephenson, and Winnebago Counties are invited to attend, learn more, and consider joining the Council!
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Thanks to the generosity of local donors and the hard work of scholarship reviewers, the Community Foundation of Northern Illinois has recently finished its 2019 - 2020 scholarship season, making 176 awards worth up to $305,046 to local students. The scholarships will support the post-secondary educational aspirations of 144 students from 27 local high schools.
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The Community Foundation of Northern Illinois has kept faith with its mission to serve as a catalyst for giving in order to attract, preserve, and grow an endowment for the current and future needs of the people of Northern Illinois for more than 65 years. This uneasy time facing a global pandemic is no different; in fact, it is the foresight and generosity of past generations that allows CFNIL to respond now with both targeted and general support for the challenges facing our local communities.
“We’re focused on endowment because we’re long term thinkers. Some of the seeds we plant are not going to come up for eight years, so it was not a struggle for us to imagine that we should start planning now for what the needs might be in ten or twenty years.” -- Bernie Buchholz, Friends of Nachusa Grasslands, which established an Agency Endowment Fund with CFNIL in 2014