2023

2023 Grant Champions & Their Causes

The Winner of our 2023 First Place Grant in the amount of $30,000 is…

Cradles to Crayons Chicago

Cradles to Crayons Chicago (C2C) provides children from birth through age 12, living in homeless or low-income situations, with the essential items they need to thrive – at home, at school and at play. C2C supplies these items free of charge by engaging and connecting communities and partner organizations.

C2C’s efficient and effective three-step model provides kids with the essentials they need, free of charge by engaging communities that have and connecting them with communities that need.

Step 1: New and nearly new children’s items are collected through grassroots community drives and donations.

Step 2: Donations are then processed and packaged by volunteers in C2C’s warehouse, The Giving Factory®.

Step 3: Packages from The Giving Factory are distributed to local children — through C2C’s collaborative network of diverse service partners.

The $30,000 PYP grant will be used specifically to fund the Cradles to Crayons Everyday Essentials initiative to provide and distribute clothing, coats, books, school supplies, hygiene items, diapers and wipes to children and families in Cook County.

1 in 2 children in Chicago live in low income and homeless situations. Without adequate and appropriate clothing and other essential items, children face unfair barriers and participate in life on an unequal playing field. Our PYP grant dollars will help to instill dignity, confidence and a sense of self-worth to children by providing essential items they might otherwise go without.

Grant Champion: Shawna Radzik

The Runner-Up, Receiving a Grant in the amount of $8,000 is…

Northwestern Settlement is a non-profit organization in Chicago founded over 130 years ago to help immigrants to the West Town neighborhood get social services and has adapted to the community’s changing population and needs over the years. They are guided by a mission to disrupt generational poverty by supporting, preparing, and empowering young people at distinct stages of life to break down barriers on their path to success in adulthood. The Settlement’s theory of change has three key components – to nurture, educate and inspire. Each program is aligned with this mission to support youth, families, and the Chicago community.

The Settlement now serves families from all over Chicago through its programs in early childhood education (Head Start), K-8 education at Rowe Charter School, after-school teen and youth services, mental health services at the Family CARES center, food pantry, emergency services, and a summer camp; House in the Woods in Wisconsin. They believe early intervention, exposure to high-quality education, and holistic services can end generational poverty and open doors to better futures.

Winning a grant from Pitch Your Peers would go a long way in supporting the work of this mission, as public funding and student enrollment in the City of Chicago are declining. The PYP grant would be explicitly used to send the 2024 graduating 8th-grade class to Washington D.C., for a class trip. This is an exciting opportunity to open doors for the Rowe scholars and inspire them with lessons not possible within the walls of a classroom. Exposure and experience to new places and ideas is something many of us take for granted with our own children, but it is one way we can break the cycle of poverty and set these young people on a new path.

This trip isn’t possible without your support.

Grant Champion: Amy Chung

The Third Place Winner, Receiving a Grant in the amount of $5,000 is…

Philanthropy Tank is a non-profit organization that focuses on students in 8th-11 grades looking to make impactful, sustainable change in their communities through the development of service driven programs. The fundamental aims of Philanthropy Tank are to help shape students’ leadership paths and, through their creative solutions, address and improve social issues in our community while embracing the core of our mission – Empowering CHANGEmakers and developing our next generation of philanthropic leaders. Philanthropy Tank is unique in that our programs are conceived, led, and implemented by the students.

The students have a support team to advise and mentor them through the development and strategic planning process of their program. Philanthropist Investors give of their own charitable dollars to fund program budgets and select those programs that they would like to support and champion. Since our inception, Philanthropy Tank has engaged over 1000 teens and launched over 70 programs impacting hundreds of thousands of individuals who benefitted from the services and resources provided. Of the programs launched, 85% completed their intended program goals and a total of 65% of our Year One through current year programs remain active, sustainable programs serving their communities. In addition, almost 40% of all the programs launched have progressed and acquired their own 501c3 status, becoming independent nonprofit organizations.

This grant will support efforts to expand our organization’s ability to serve Chicago teens. Funds will support our outreach efforts to recruit our first-year applicants and programming efforts for Philanthropy Tank-Chicago. We will open our application for the 2023-2024 school year and begin onsite ideation and application workshops through the implementation of Social Impact Days and collaboration with area agencies that work with teens.

Grant Champion: Julie Brandt