Calhoun Family Foundation

Calhoun Family Foundation is a young (IRS ruling July 2021), unstaffed private family foundation administered c/o GS Wealth Services out of a PO Box in Albany, NY. Its four trustees — Jessica Calhoun Devine, Amy L. Calhoun, Corey A. Calhoun, and Devon P. Calhoun — all serve without compensation, and public 990 filings carry a legal name of "David L and Barbara D Calhoun Family Foundation," consistent with an adult-children-run vehicle for a founding couple's wealth. Net assets have grown explosively — from $242,367 at inception (FY2021) to $522,259 (FY2022), $847,956 (FY2023), roughly $3.46M (FY2024), and $5,567,989 (FY2025) — funded almost entirely by fresh family contributions ($346,168 in FY2023 alone) rather than investment returns (net investment income has never exceeded $14,624 in a filed year). Every documented grant, without exception, is coded "General" or "General Charitable Purposes": there is no stated mission statement beyond boilerplate 501(c)(3) support language, no published program areas, and no LOI or proposal process. This is a relationship-only, invitation-based funder. Its six known grantees since 2022 — Ann & Robert Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago (funded twice), A Better Chance Inc, Massachusetts Down Syndrome Congress, Pan Mass Challenge, Mary Meyer School, and Project Sunapee — are mainstream, well-established 501(c)(3)s clustered around family geography (Chicago, the Boston suburbs, New York City, and Lake Sunapee, NH) rather than a public priority area. First-time applicants should recognize there is no public inbox to land a cold proposal in: no application_form_url, no funding_cycle, and no deadline exist in either the foundation's own filings or its web footprint. The realistic route in is a warm connection to a trustee, a shared institution, or involvement with an organization already on the grantee list — not a submitted application. Because giving nearly quadrupled between FY2024 (~$45,842) and FY2025 ($165,075) while assets kept climbing, this foundation is in an active growth phase; a relationship built now, before any formal process calcifies, carries outsized long-term value compared to waiting for a public program to emerge.

Documented grant totals by fiscal year: FY2021 $0 (inception year); FY2022 $10,000 (1 grant); FY2023 $35,000-$45,000 depending on source (Granted's DB records 5 grants totaling $45,000, avg $9,000; the FY2023 990 grants-paid line shows $35,095); FY2024 approximately $43,000-$45,842 across 6 grants (avg ~$7,000-$9,000); FY2025 $165,075, a roughly 4x jump with grantee-level detail not yet publicly itemized. Individual gift sizes documented to date: Ann & Robert Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago, $20,000 (2024) plus a prior gift, $30,000 cumulative across two years and the single largest relationship; A Better Chance Inc, $5,000-$7,000; Massachusetts Down Syndrome Congress, $5,000; Pan Mass Challenge, $5,000; Mary Meyer School, $5,000; Project Sunapee, $1,000. Median documented gift size is roughly $5,000-$7,000, with a range of $1,000 to $20,000 per grant — no six-figure single grants have been publicly itemized despite the FY2025 total pool reaching $165,075. By recipient mission rather than formal category (none is coded beyond "General"), giving skews toward pediatric health/hospital care (Lurie Children's is the largest and only repeat recipient, roughly 40-45% of documented dollars), disability advocacy (MA Down Syndrome Congress), cancer-research fundraising (Pan Mass Challenge, which benefits Dana-Farber Cancer Institute), and education access (A Better Chance, Mary Meyer School). No arts, environment, or advocacy grants are documented. Geographically, recipients sit in Illinois (Chicago, 2 grantees), Massachusetts (Needham and Burlington, 2 grantees), New York (New York City, 1 grantee per Granted's DB), and New Hampshire (Sunapee, 1 grantee from web research) — a footprint consistent with personal/family ties rather than a stated regional priority, since no geographic_focus is recorded in IRS data. The clearest trend is capacity growth: total giving rose from $10,000 (FY2022) to an estimated $165,075 (FY2025), a roughly 16x increase in three years, while net assets grew roughly 23x over the same window (from $242,367 to $5,567,989) — almost entirely contribution-driven, meaning future giving capacity should keep expanding as long as the family continues funding the vehicle.

All five peer foundations cluster at nearly identical asset levels ($5,566,810-$5,569,086) despite being unrelated family vehicles spread across five states — a strong signal these are same-vintage entities (likely converted or funded through a similar trust/wealth-management structure around the same time) rather than foundations that share Calhoun's actual giving philosophy. With the single exception of Two Lights Foundation, none of these peers — including Calhoun — maintain a public website or disclosed application process, confirming that Calhoun sits within a large, largely invisible cohort of small single-family "check-writing" foundations. Grant seekers should treat outreach to any of these six the same way: via a personal introduction rather than a submission portal, and Two Lights' site is worth a quick check as the one example of published guidance from a foundation this size.

No dedicated press releases, news coverage, or public announcements exist for Calhoun Family Foundation in 2025-2026 — expected, since it has no communications staff, newsletter, or working website of its own. Notably, the website on file in Granted's database (calhoun.org) actually belongs to The Calhoun School, an unrelated Manhattan private school; grant seekers should disregard that URL entirely as a contact channel. The only substantive activity found is financial, drawn from the foundation's own Form 990-PF filings: net assets rose from $847,956 (FY2023) to approximately $3.46M (FY2024) to $5,567,989 (FY2025), funded by new family contributions rather than investment gains. Grant disbursements followed the same trajectory — $10,000 (FY2022), $35,095 (FY2023), roughly $45,842 (FY2024), and $165,075 (FY2025) — a nearly 4x jump in the most recent filing year. Leadership has been stable throughout: the same four Calhoun family trustees (Jessica Calhoun Devine, Amy L. Calhoun, Corey A. Calhoun, Devon P. Calhoun) have served unpaid since the foundation's July 2021 IRS ruling, with no reported additions, departures, or new hires. No new program announcements, published guidelines, or public statements from the foundation were located in this research. The practical takeaway is forward-looking rather than newsy: given the growth curve in both assets and giving, this foundation's capacity is expanding quickly, so relationships built now — before any formal program, staff, or portal is established — are likely to carry outsized value relative to waiting for a public process to emerge.

There is no public application process to optimize: application_form_url, application_deadline, and funding_cycle are all unset in the foundation's own filings, and the DB's application_instructions field literally records "__none__." That absence is itself the key strategic fact. Grants are administered care of GS Wealth Services at a PO Box in Albany, NY — a family-office administrative address, not a program office, so a cold letter there is unlikely to reach a trustee or receive a response. The only realistic entry point is a warm personal connection to one of the four trustees (Jessica Calhoun Devine, Amy L. Calhoun, Corey A. Calhoun, Devon P. Calhoun) — through board membership, gala or event committee involvement, or a shared school, employer, or institution. Study the existing grantee list for pattern-matching before reaching out: Ann & Robert Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago (pediatric health, the largest and only twice-funded recipient), Pan Mass Challenge (a Dana-Farber-benefiting cycling fundraiser based in Needham, MA), Massachusetts Down Syndrome Congress, A Better Chance Inc (minority education access, NYC), Mary Meyer School, and Project Sunapee (a small New Hampshire community organization). Organizations working in pediatric health, disability services, cancer-research fundraising, or education access — especially those based in Chicago, the Boston suburbs, New York City, or the Lake Sunapee, NH area — sit closer to the foundation's documented pattern than an unrelated cause or geography. Every recorded gift has been general-operating/unrestricted rather than project- or capital-specific, so if a connection is made, lead with an unrestricted-support ask rather than a narrow project budget. Grant sizes have run small (four-figure to low five-figure, $1,000-$20,000 per gift) even as the asset base has grown past $5.5M — don't anchor an ask above roughly $20,000-$25,000 without independent evidence the foundation has scaled its per-grant size alongside its FY2025 total-giving jump to $165,075. The most common mistake would be treating this like a program-staffed foundation and submitting a formal LOI or proposal package — there is no one to route it to, and time is far better spent identifying a personal introduction path. There is no disclosed "ask season" or review cycle, so relationship-building can start at any time, but budget for a multi-month runway, consistent with how unstaffed family foundations typically make decisions on an ad hoc or annual basis.