The Mcgowan Family Foundation
Omaha, NE · EIN 47-0795668. Reported 94 grants totalling $4,136,389 to 42 organizations across tax years 2021-2024, on Form 990 Schedule I.
Does this grantmaker accept applications?
Its tax return does not say, and we will not guess. Private foundations file Form 990-PF, which asks outright whether they fund only organizations they select themselves -- 78% say yes, and that one answer is what lets the rest of this site tell you which foundations are worth approaching. Grantmaking charities like this one file a regular Form 990 instead, and the IRS never puts the question to them. Anyone claiming to know the answer from the filing is inventing it.
Three things in the filing do bear on it:
- What kind of organization it is. For The Mcgowan Family Foundation, the IRS classifies it under religion rather than as a grantmaker (NTEE X99Z) -- it is an operating charity that also makes grants.
- How spread out its giving is. 42 distinct organizations, with 13% of the dollars going to the largest single recipient. That is genuinely spread out -- the mark of a funder making many independent decisions rather than underwriting one institution.
- How much its list changes. 65% of one year's grantees are funded again the next, across 3 year-to-year transitions. That is about the 57% median for grantmaking charities -- noticeably lower than the 67% private foundations manage. Organizations like this one rotate more of their list each year, which is where an opening for a newcomer tends to be.
How big are its grants?
The median reported grant is $25,000. Half of what it reported fell between $15,000 and $50,000; the smallest was $5,200 and the largest $255,250. If you are asking for materially more than the top of that range, you are asking the wrong organization.
Every organization it funded
This is the complete list from its filings, largest first. Recipients are grouped by the EIN the filer reported, not by name, so an organization that was typed differently in two years appears once rather than twice.
| Organization | Location | Total received | Grants | Years funded | Last |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Creighton Prep | Omaha, NE | $550,200 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Nebraska Methodist Hospital Foundation | Omaha, NE | $500,000 | 2 | 2 | 2022 |
| Breakthrough T1D | New York, NY | $387,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Heart Ministry Center Inc | Omaha, NE | $285,500 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Jesuit Academy | Omaha, NE | $221,250 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| University of Nebraska Foundation | Lincoln, NE | $198,000 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Texas Christian University | Fort Worth, TX | $160,149 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Completely Kids | Omaha, NE | $141,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Omaha Performing Arts Society | Omaha, NE | $138,750 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Childrens Hospital & Medical Center Foundation | Omaha, NE | $125,000 | 1 | 1 | 2021 |
| College of St Mary | Omaha, NE | $120,000 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Omaha Equestrian Foundation | Omaha, NE | $104,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Christ the King Church | Omaha, NE | $100,500 | 3 | 3 | 2023 |
| Omaha Discovery Tr | Omaha, NE | $100,000 | 1 | 1 | 2022 |
| University of Southern California | Los Angeles, CA | $100,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Westside Community Schools Foundation Inc | Omaha, NE | $100,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Northstar Foundation | Omaha, NE | $82,500 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Iowa State University | Ames, IA | $75,000 | 3 | 3 | 2023 |
| Creighton University | Omaha, NE | $50,000 | 2 | 2 | 2022 |
| Ignatian Corporation Saint Ignatius High School | San Francisco, CA | $50,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Red Cloud Indian School | Pine Ridge, SD | $50,000 | 2 | 2 | 2023 |
| Drake University | Des Moines, IA | $49,000 | 2 | 2 | 2022 |
| Washburn University Foundation | Topeka, KS | $46,570 | 3 | 3 | 2023 |
| Museum of Nebraska Art | Kearney, NE | $45,000 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| National Foundation for Ectodermal Dysplasias | Fairview Hts, IL | $45,000 | 3 | 3 | 2023 |
| Skutt Catholic Highschool | Omaha, NE | $34,940 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Arizona State University Foundation for a New American University | Tempe, AZ | $34,330 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| City of Omaha Police Foundation Inc | Omaha, NE | $25,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Iowa State University Foundation | Ames, IA | $25,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Revive Inc | Hastings, NE | $25,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Siena Francis House | Omaha, NE | $25,000 | 1 | 1 | 2022 |
| Winston Preparatory School | New York, NY | $25,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Xcancer Foundation | Omaha, NE | $25,000 | 1 | 1 | 2021 |
| Cancer Fund Inc | Washington, DC | $15,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| National Fragile X Foundation | Washington, DC | $15,000 | 2 | 2 | 2022 |
| Board of Regents of the University of Nebraska | Lincoln, NE | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Nebraska Greats Foundation | Omaha, NE | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2021 |
| Partnership 4 Kids | Omaha, NE | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| Quality Living Inc | Omaha, NE | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2024 |
| St Patricks Catholic Church | Elkhorn, NE | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Central High School Foundation | Omaha, NE | $7,500 | 1 | 1 | 2021 |
| Childrens Scholarship Fund of Omaha | Omaha, NE | $5,200 | 1 | 1 | 2022 |
24 of 42 (57%) received money in more than one year over the 4 years we hold. Remember the $5,000 floor: an organization funded every year at $3,000 shows up here as never funded at all.
What the money was for
Taken verbatim from the purpose column of its filings, largest first. This is the closest thing to a statement of what it funds, in its own words.
- Jdrf
Disease, Disorders, Medical - Methodist Hospital Foundation
Health - General Rehabilitative - Heart Ministry Center
Agriculture, Food, Nutrition - Omaha Equestrian Foundation
Recreation, Sports, Leisure - Christ the King Church
Religion, Spiritual Development - Omaha Performing Arts
Arts, Culture, Humanities
What kind of organizations it funds
By each recipient's own IRS classification, for the 33 of 42 recipients we could match to a registered organization. These are assigned categories, not our guesses -- Schedule I reports the recipient's EIN, so this is a lookup rather than a name match.
Giving by year
| Tax year | Grants reported | Total | Median grant |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 25 | $1,142,669 | $25,000 |
| 2022 | 25 | $1,114,211 | $25,000 |
| 2023 | 20 | $618,029 | $25,000 |
| 2024 | 24 | $1,261,480 | $25,000 |
Tax years, not calendar years, and the most recent year is usually incomplete -- Form 990 arrives about a year after the year it covers, so a low final year means late paperwork rather than a grantmaker winding down.
Where its money goes
74% of its giving went to organizations in Nebraska. Community foundations and federated funds are usually the most geographically bounded funders there are -- being outside the footprint is normally disqualifying in a way that a weak programme fit is not.
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Funders that support the same organizations
These grantmakers and private foundations gave to organizations this one also funded. Shared grantees are the strongest signal available that two funders have overlapping priorities -- and a funder already backing your peers is a far warmer prospect than one that merely lists your cause.
How to approach this grantmaker
- Look for a published programme first. Unlike most private foundations, organizations of this kind often do run open, deadlined grant cycles with written guidelines. Its own website is the authority on that; this page is the authority on who it has actually paid.
- Check you are its size. The median reported grant is $25,000 -- and because grants under $5,000 need not be reported, it very likely writes smaller cheques than this page can see.
- Check you are in its geography. Its giving concentrates in Nebraska.
- Read the recipient list for organizations like yours. If nothing on it resembles your work, that is a real answer and a cheap one to get.
Where these numbers come from
Everything above is taken from The Mcgowan Family Foundation's own Form 990 Schedule I filings, which the IRS publishes in bulk. We used 4 returns (tax years 2021-2024). Nothing here is scraped, inferred or estimated.
On its most recent return it told the IRS it made grants to 24 section 501(c)(3) organizations and 0 other organizations. That is the filer's own count for one year; the totals above cover every year we hold.
Address of record on the latest return: 1120 S 101 St 320, Omaha, NE, 68124.
EIN 47-0795668 · See the original filings on ProPublica · How we build this
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