Macdonald Foundation

The Macdonald Foundation is a small, family-run private foundation (EIN 33-6269762) based in Wausau, Wisconsin, governed entirely by trustees Mark, Donna, and Matthew Macdonald — the family that owns the Wisconsin Woodchucks baseball club and the Wausau Ignite soccer club, both part of the Northwoods League ecosystem. With $12.0M in assets (FY2024) and no paid officers, this is a hands-on, personally-directed giving vehicle rather than a staffed institution, and it should be approached accordingly: as a relationship, not a portal.

The foundation's own filings mark application instructions as "none" and flag its process as preselected, and the grantee list bears this out — of the roughly 50 organizations receiving the bulk of its giving, most show repeat gifts across 3 consecutive filed years, concentrated overwhelmingly around Wausau/Marathon County, Wisconsin (93 of 139 tracked grants) with a secondary cluster in Oregon's Rogue Valley (21 grants, likely reflecting a second-home or personal tie for the family). First-time applicants without an existing relationship to the Macdonalds, the Woodchucks/Ignite organizations, or a Wausau-area community institution face real headwinds through the general giving channel.

The one clearly open, competitive pathway is the Work Ethic Scholarship, administered through the Community Foundation of North Central Wisconsin rather than the foundation itself. It draws real competition (64 applicants for 25 awards in 2025-26) and explicitly rewards demonstrated student employment history over pure academic credentials — trustee Mark Macdonald has publicly framed part-time and summer work as central to the family's giving philosophy.

For nonprofits pursuing general operating or program support, the realistic path is local visibility and warm introduction: get known within Wausau's civic and youth-services network (United Way-adjacent groups, the Community Foundation of North Central Wisconsin, Boys & Girls Club Wausau, Marshfield Clinic Health System's philanthropic circles), since that is where nearly all of the foundation's non-scholarship dollars already flow. Cold LOIs into a foundation with no listed contact email and an unpublished process are unlikely to convert; a warm referral through an existing grantee or the Community Foundation is the higher-percentage move.

Across the most recently tracked grant cohort (46 grants), the Macdonald Foundation's typical gift ranges from $250 to $75,000, with a median of just $5,000 and an average of $13,668 — a pattern typical of a small family foundation making many modest, targeted gifts rather than a few large transformational ones. A broader multi-year snapshot of 139 tracked grants totaling $1,837,355 shows a similar average of $13,218.

Geographically, giving is heavily concentrated in Wisconsin: 93 of 139 tracked grants (67%) went to Wisconsin organizations, almost entirely in and around Wausau and Marathon County. Oregon is a distant but consistent second at 21 grants (15%), clustered in the Rogue Valley (Ashland/Medford area — Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Southern Oregon University, Southern Oregon Land Conservancy, Rogue Valley Farm to School). The remainder is scattered in small amounts across CA, DC, NY, IL, NE, UT, VA, and WA (2-7 grants each), largely reflecting national organizations (JDRF, American Red Cross, National Parks Conservation Association) rather than a deliberate multi-state strategy.

By program area, the largest cumulative recipients span four buckets: (1) education/scholarships — Rolling Hills Preparatory School ($225,000 across 3 gifts), St Pius X St Matthias ($150,000/3 gifts), Newman Catholic Schools, and the Work Ethic Scholarship conduit itself via the Community Foundation of North Central Wisconsin ($140,500/3 gifts); (2) health/human services — Marshfield Clinic Health System ($131,000/3 gifts for its Children's Miracle Network mission), JDRF ($70,000), The Women's Community ($60,000); (3) youth development — Boys & Girls Club Wausau ($82,500), Big Brothers Big Sisters North Central Wisconsin ($60,000); and (4) community/capital — a single $119,000 gift to the City of Wausau for Athletic Park lighting and $100,000 (2 gifts) to Community Partners Campus for below-market nonprofit office space.

On the financial trend line, total giving has softened from $734,603 (FY2019) to $667,896 (FY2020), $666,605 (FY2021), $648,546 (FY2022), and $627,118 (FY2023) — a gradual ~15% decline over five years even as assets grew from $11.1M to $12.0M and net investment income stayed strong ($786,490 in FY2023). This suggests a foundation payng out below what steady investment returns would support, leaving room for giving to rebound.

The five closest asset-matched peers in the same NTEE "Philanthropy & Grantmaking" category cluster tightly around $12.29M in assets — a coincidence of the matching methodology rather than evidence these funders behave alike. None of the five has a public website on file, and none was independently researched for this report, so their giving levels and focus areas below reflect only what limited public data exists.

What distinguishes the Macdonald Foundation from this asset-matched peer set is transparency and traceability: it has an actual public grant history (139 tracked grants), a documented scholarship program with a named administrative partner, and identifiable trustees with a visible local civic profile (the Wisconsin Woodchucks/Wausau Ignite ownership). Grant seekers researching the peer foundations listed here will likely need to go directly to ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer or state AG filings, since none currently surface a grants footprint or contact channel in this dataset.

The most concrete recent activity is the 2025-26 Work Ethic Scholarship cycle: 25 scholarships worth $55,500 total were announced around September 11, 2025, split between 13 graduating high school seniors ($1,500 each) and 12 current college students ($3,000 each), selected from a pool of 64 applicants. Trustee Mark Macdonald used the announcement to reiterate the family's giving philosophy — that part-time and summer jobs teach "discipline, respect, work ethic, and the value of a dollar" — and noted that while eight winners had ties to the Woodchucks/Ignite organizations and others to the Wausau Parks Department or Peoples State Bank, 15 of the 25 winners had no prior organizational connection at all.

That figure is up from a reported roughly $45,000 in the 2024 cycle per Wausau Pilot & Review, suggesting the scholarship program is growing year over year even as the foundation's broader taxable giving has trended flat-to-down over the same multi-year window (FY2019-FY2023 giving fell from $734,603 to $627,118).

No leadership changes, new program launches, or major one-time capital gifts newer than the FY2023 filing were found in this search — the trustee roster (Mark, Donna, and Matthew Macdonald) appears stable across all available filings. No independent news coverage beyond the annual scholarship announcement and youth-sports sponsorship listings (e.g., Wausau Youth Baseball & Softball) was located for 2025-2026. Grant seekers should treat the scholarship announcement as the most current, verifiable signal of the foundation's active giving cadence.

This is not a foundation with an open RFP or downloadable grant application for general nonprofit funding — its own filings list application instructions as none and flag the process as preselected. Treat the general giving channel as invitation-only and build visibility through Wausau/Marathon County civic and youth-sports networks rather than submitting a cold proposal.

For the one open, competitive pathway — the Work Ethic Scholarship — apply through the Community Foundation of North Central Wisconsin's website (cfoncw.org), not the Macdonald Foundation directly; this is a common point of confusion since the scholarship carries the Macdonald name but is processed by a third-party administrator. The 2025-26 cycle drew 64 applicants for 25 awards (a roughly 39% win rate), so it is competitive but not a long shot. Graduating seniors are eligible for $1,500 and current college students for $3,000.

The single most specific, funder-stated preference is employment history: trustee Mark Macdonald has gone on record that part-time or summer work is central to what the family looks for, framing it as evidence of discipline and maturity. Scholarship essays and letters of recommendation should explicitly document work history — hours, employer, duration, and what the student learned — rather than leading with GPA or extracurricular titles alone. Unsuccessful applicants are explicitly permitted to reapply in future years, so a rejection is not terminal.

For nonprofits (not students) hoping to break into general giving, the clearest available signal is the existing 3-year repeat-gift pattern across roughly 50 organizations, nearly all either Wausau-based youth/human-services groups or tied to institutions the Macdonald family already touches (Woodchucks/Ignite, Peoples State Bank, the Wausau Parks Department, Marshfield Clinic). A warm introduction through one of those existing grantees, or through the Community Foundation of North Central Wisconsin's broader donor network, is far more likely to succeed than an unsolicited letter to the foundation's Bayview Drive mailing address. Given the small median gift size ($5,000), organizations should also right-size the ask — this is not a foundation that writes six-figure unsolicited checks outside of a handful of long-standing capital relationships (e.g., the $119,000 Athletic Park lighting gift, a single large capital exception rather than the norm).