Amelia Peabody Foundation

The Amelia Peabody Foundation operates as a Massachusetts-only private trust with a singular, tightly defined mission: increasing positive learning experiences for materially disadvantaged young people across the state. Its $165.5M endowment (FY2024) generates roughly $10–12M in annual giving, making it one of the larger youth-focused foundations in New England — but the board maintains a deliberately narrow aperture. Organizations outside that lane, regardless of merit, are turned away.

The governance structure is small and personal. A board of named trustees — Dolores Reid, Deborah Carlson, Bayard Waring, Phillip Waring, and Vincent Marturano — reviews every application. Chief Investment Officer Joseph Kelly ($399,999 compensation in FY2024) oversees the endowment, while Grantmaking Associate Nicole Lania handles day-to-day application intake and portal support. There is no program officer layer between applicants and the trustees, which means proposals land directly in front of decision-makers who evaluate them personally.

For first-time applicants, the most important strategic move is the pre-application Calendly session the foundation offers before each deadline. This is not a perfunctory courtesy — it is a fit-screening mechanism that the foundation built precisely to avoid wasting its time and yours. Organizations that skip it and submit cold proposals demonstrate poor research instincts. Schedule this session, come with a clear one-paragraph description of your program and population served, and ask specifically whether your scope aligns with current priorities.

Relationship progression at this foundation is gradual. Analysis of the top 50 grantees shows that leading recipients — Youth Enrichment Services ($460K, 7 grants), Boys & Girls Clubs of Metro South ($375K, 6 grants), Boys & Girls Club of Lynn ($285K, 6 grants) — built those totals over 3–7 funding cycles. Initial grants typically land in the $15,000–$30,000 range. Organizations that deliver on their reporting obligations and demonstrate measurable outcomes are invited back and grow their ask incrementally. View the first grant as an audition, not a destination.

The foundation strongly prefers organizations serving communities outside Greater Boston — gateway cities like Lawrence, Lowell, Springfield, Fall River, and Haverhill appear repeatedly among top grantees. If your work is Boston-centric, be prepared to articulate why your model cannot be replicated by the dense philanthropic infrastructure already present in Greater Boston.

The Amelia Peabody Foundation has maintained consistent annual giving between $10M and $12M across a decade of operations: $9.99M (2015), $10.5M (2014), $10.2M (2019), $10.1M (2020), $11.9M (2021), $11.3M (2022), $10.9M (2023). Grants paid (the cash disbursed in a given year) are a useful sub-metric: $7.66M (2014), $7.21M (2015), $6.84M (2019), $6.28M (2020), $8.62M (2021), $8.03M (2022), $6.33M (2023). The gap between total giving and grants paid reflects multi-year grant commitments booked in one year and paid in subsequent ones.

Typical grant size data from 184 tracked grants: median $30,000, average $46,950, range $10,000–$500,000. The foundation itself describes its bands as: $15,000–$50,000 for program or operating support; $50,000–$100,000+ for capital improvements or transformative operational expansions. This guidance is largely borne out in the grantee data, where most individual grants to a single recipient in a single year fall in the $25,000–$75,000 range, with occasional outliers.

Grant concentration is striking. The 10 largest lifetime recipients account for approximately 36% of the $28.7M in tracked grantee disbursements. Boys & Girls Club chapters alone (7 separate chapters in the top 50) received a combined $2.2M+. Massachusetts Charter Public School Association sits at the top with $600,000 over 4 grants. This signals that the foundation values intermediary organizations that aggregate impact across multiple sites or communities.

By program area, youth development dominates: afterschool programs, summer enrichment, college-access pathways, and sports-based learning (tennis, soccer, culinary training) all appear. Family stabilization funding flows to food access (Open Table, Third Sector New England via Future Chefs), workforce development (Mujeres Unidas Avanzando, CodeSquad), and housing/economic mobility (Just A Start's Economic Mobility Hub). Geographic distribution is 100% Massachusetts, with observable clustering in Lawrence, Lowell, Springfield, Lynn, Fall River, and Haverhill — the gateway city footprint the foundation now explicitly prioritizes.

The five peer foundations identified in the database are matched by asset size (~$165M) but differ substantially in geography, focus, and accessibility:

Amelia Peabody is the standout accessible funder in this peer set. While the others in this asset tier are largely invitation-only family foundations with little to no public-facing application infrastructure, Amelia Peabody maintains a full online grant portal (GrantInterface), publishes deadlines 12 months in advance, offers pre-application advisory sessions, and accepts unsolicited proposals from any qualifying MA nonprofit. For Massachusetts-based youth and family organizations, this combination of substantial endowment ($165.5M), consistent payout ($10–12M/year), and open accessibility makes Amelia Peabody one of the most strategically important funders in the state.

The most concrete recent grant activity visible in the public record is from November 2025, when Open Table — a Metro-West Massachusetts food access nonprofit serving 21 communities — publicly acknowledged receipt of an Amelia Peabody Foundation grant for general operations. The grant supported programs providing nutritious meals and groceries to families from under-resourced communities, consistent with the foundation's family stabilization track.

On the financial side, the FY2024 990 was filed November 17, 2025, and reflects a significant jump in assets: total assets rose to $165,467,815 from $135,682,150 the prior year, a 22% increase fueled by $40.9M in total revenue. This is the largest single-year asset gain in the foundation's available financial history and likely reflects strong endowment performance in 2024 equity markets. Whether this translates into meaningfully higher grantmaking in FY2025–2026 is uncertain, but the endowment health is strong.

On the leadership front, Margaret St Clair formally stepped down as Executive Director after December 31, 2022, a transition that appears to have been orderly. No new Executive Director has been publicly named; day-to-day grantmaking operations appear to be handled by Nicole Lania (Grantmaking Associate) under trustee oversight. Joseph Kelly continues as Chief Investment Officer, with compensation increasing to $399,999 in FY2024.

The foundation's 2026 grant calendar is posted: February 11, May 20, and September 9 deadlines, with applications opening approximately two months prior to each date.

Timing matters. Three cycles run in 2026: deadlines of February 11, May 20, and September 9. Applications open roughly two months before each deadline (so December, March, and July respectively). The May cycle is historically mid-year and may see slightly lighter competition than the February cycle, which follows the holiday fundraising season.

Use the pre-application Calendly session. The foundation explicitly offers limited pre-application sessions to answer fit and scope questions. Booking this call before your first application signals professionalism and gives you real intelligence on trustee priorities for the current cycle. Bring a concise program summary and a proposed grant amount — don't just ask open-ended questions.

Lead with leadership. The foundation explicitly states that organizational leadership is among the most important evaluation factors. In your application narrative, introduce the executive director and key program staff by name and highlight their track records. This is not the place for generic boilerplate about your organization's history.

Size your ask appropriately. The $15,000–$50,000 range is the sweet spot for program and operating grants. First-time applicants should anchor to the lower end ($15,000–$25,000) unless there is a specific capital need that maps to one of the three current capital priorities: childcare access, community health center expansion, or affordable housing/shelter. Do not request $100,000+ on a first application without a transformative capital project to justify it.

Geographic framing is decisive. If your work is outside Greater Boston — particularly in Lawrence, Lowell, Springfield, Holyoke, Fall River, Brockton, or other gateway cities — lead with that. State clearly that your community has limited access to the philanthropic density of Boston, and quantify the gap if possible.

Keep the application clean. No letters of support. No brochures. No lengthy organizational histories. No promotional materials. The foundation will ask for what it needs. Extra materials signal that you did not read the instructions, which is disqualifying.

Report compliance gates future funding. Prior-cycle grantees cannot apply for new funding until narrative and expenditure reports are filed and approved. File reports promptly at grant term end — administrative delays will lock you out of the next cycle.