Echo Park. Watts. Compton. Long Beach. Across Los Angeles, more families are counting on Children's Institute this year than ever before.
For more than a century, we’ve shown up where the need is greatest. We provide high-quality preschools, healing-centered mental health care, and community hubs that connect families to opportunity.
We stay for as long as it takes because every child deserves the chance to thrive.
Make a high impact donation with private, personalized guidance.
A leadership gift does three different things at three different speeds. We measure all three.
Your gift becomes a same-week therapy intake for a child in crisis. It sends a REACH Team of crisis counselors to a family's door the day after a shooting. It pairs a foster youth with the case manager who will walk them to graduation.
Across our programs, a single year of leadership funding produces graduating cohorts and outcomes you can hold in your hand. Project Fatherhood completion. Head Start kindergarten readiness rates.
The children you help today will raise children of their own. When you stabilize a child early, you change what becomes possible for everyone they will ever raise. This is the part of the work that does not photograph well. It is also the part that matters most.
When my son Niko was born, I was filled with love but also fear. As an ambitious single parent with limited support, I worried I would have to give up on my dreams just to make ends meet. Then I found Children's Institute, and that changed everything.
When Niko was three months old, I enrolled him at one of their preschools in Watts. The caregivers welcomed us with warmth and treated Niko as if he were their own. While Niko was at preschool, I earned a promotion at work, gained financial stability, and started building a future I once thought was out of reach. Today, I am a successful, confident parent, and Niko is a joyful, thriving child, meeting every developmental milestone.
We visit expecting parents at home, from pregnancy through a baby's first year. Home visits, mental health support, and developmental guidance, before stress turns into crisis.
We run preschools for 1,000 children a year. Nutrition, family support, and classrooms built to get kids ready for kindergarten.
We help kids facing hard things at home or school. Counseling, tutoring, after-school programs, and somewhere safe to be a kid during the hours that matter most.
We coordinate physical, mental, and family health care so LA families don't have to navigate the system alone. One care manager, one phone number, one team.
LAUNCH supports LA County foster youth as they age out of the system. Mentors, mental health care, and real paths to school, work, and a place of their own.
We support parents and caregivers directly. Parenting classes, mental health care, and Project Fatherhood, a nationally recognized program that helps fathers stay present in their kids' lives.
Here is exactly where every dollar goes, calculated independently by Charity Navigator from our most recent IRS Form 990.
For every dollar you give, 81 cents goes directly to programs like preschools, mental health care, and foster youth support. 14 cents covers our campuses and infrastructure. 5 cents brings in the next dollar.
Head Start has been a great support. My family was devastated after my children’s father was diagnosed with cancer. During his bone marrow transplant, Children’s Institute changed their service hours to accommodate daily hospital visits. The children also received mental health services, encouraging my daughter to draw pictures for her dad that made him smile. My daughter also asked to cut her hair and donate it to cancer patients to make wigs for them. We are proud of her empathy for others from this experience.
The Nickerson Gardens staff were amazing.
In 2021, donors closed a $25.8 million capital campaign. The Frank Gehry-designed Watts Campus opened on June 25, 2022.
"A building can tell a kid that we love you. I hope this building will serve and inspire children, families, and this great organization for generations to come."
Opened on June 25, 2022, the iconic Frank Gehry-designed Watts Campus stands as a landmark investment in the future of children, families, and the Watts community.
One building. Approximately 70 partner organizations served.
This year marks the 120th anniversary of Children's Institute. In 1906, our founder Minnie Barton opened her doors to vulnerable women and single mothers arriving in Los Angeles with nowhere else to turn. Through every decade since, the work has stayed the same: showing up for children and families when they need it most.
Today the strain is deepening. Rising costs, food insecurity, a shrinking safety net, and barriers to healthcare are pushing more people into crisis. The need is greater than it has been in years. It is also more urgent.
Every story on this page began with someone who needed help faster than the system could provide. That is what philanthropy makes possible at Children's Institute: the ability to say yes immediately when a child, parent, or caregiver reaches out.
The donors recognized here have helped build every chapter of our work. The Gehry campus in Watts. Our new Compton early childhood centers. LAUNCH: A CII designed program supporting LA County Foster Youth. Project Fatherhood. The next chapter will be shaped by those who choose to stand with children and families now.
If this mission aligns with your philanthropic goals this year, we would welcome the chance to speak with you or to invite you to tour one of our community hub sites.
With deep gratitude,
Catherine Atack
Chief External Officer
CII can create connection at every giving level. Each gift creates a measurable outcome and a recognition option ranging from anonymous to permanently named.
A Classroom Quarter: Underwrites three months of educational materials, family engagement, and developmental tools at one of our Early Childhood Centers. 91% of children advanced in their development last year.
A Family Crisis Fund: Underwrites direct family support, therapy, food, transportation, and basic needs for families navigating crisis. This is the work that reshapes service hours when a parent needs daily hospital visits.
A Project Fatherhood Cohort: Funds one full year of Project Fatherhood circles. Last year 218 fathers completed the program. Your gift carries the next cohort.
A Year of Behavioral Health: Underwrites one year of trauma-informed behavioral health services. 84% of our clients showed meaningful improvement in well-being last year.
A Year of LAUNCH: Underwrites a full year of our new LAUNCH program for youth in the foster and probation systems. 88% of LAUNCH participants advanced in education or employment last year.
Provides prominent recognition for support of a comprehensive service area, helping advance programs that serve children and families across the LA community. Campus and program naming opportunities available.
Celebrating our supporters from our 2024–2025 fiscal year. These are the leadership partners walking alongside our CII children and families.
The Ballmer Group
Cedars Sinai Medical Center · The Conrad N. Hilton Foundation
The Aromont Charitable Foundation · Dragonfly Therapeutics · Les Amies · The PNC Foundation · QueensCare Charitable Division
Anonymous · California Community Foundation · Johnny Carson Foundation · CBRE · Tim Disney · Maura and Bill Haney · Herbalife Family Foundation · Pritzker Foster Care Initiative · Robert H. Tuttle Charitable Lead Trust
Lauren and Chuck Diamond · Susan Disney Lord, Roy P. Disney and Abigail Disney · Joseph Drown Foundation · Dwight Stuart Youth Foundation · Great Public Schools Now · Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles · RAR Family Foundation · Michael and Irene Ross Endowment Fund of the Jewish Community Foundation · Specialty Family Foundation · W.M. Keck Foundation
Bel Air Investment Advisors · The Fran and Ray Stark Foundation · Gallagher Insurance Risk Management · In-N-Out Burger Foundation · KPMG LLP · Lionsgate · O'Melveny and Meyers · The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation · PwC · UnitedHealthcare · The Walt Disney Company · Warner Bros. Television Group · Wells Fargo Bank · KLM Foundation · Cindy and Alan Horn · Jamie Alter Lynton and Michael Lynton · Sally and Paul R. Kanin · Vera R. Campbell Foundation · The Ronus Foundation
Plus partners at every level below, anonymous donors who chose privacy, and government funders including the California Department of Education, Los Angeles County agencies, and the federal Department of Health and Human Services. The complete honor roll lives in our 2024–2025 Annual Report.
Four voices from the families, young people, and partners we serve. Every quote below is pulled directly from CII's published 2023–2024 and 2024–2025 Annual Reports.
Children's Institute gave my family the confidence and assurance that our child would be safe, supported, and encouraged to thrive. Since enrolling, we've seen incredible growth in his development and independence.
Even on days when I'm exhausted, I show up because Children's Institute, this program, and my home-based teacher are helping my children learn, grow, and thrive.
Children's Institute team members are trusted, embedded members of the school community. Students and families gain access to opportunities and programs that can truly change the trajectory of their lives.
Children's Institute has been a safe haven for me and my family. From the moment we walked through the door, we felt cared for.
Every gift moves the work forward. If you would rather skip the conversation and contribute online today, you can do that here. We will follow up with a thank you, not a sales call.
Every leadership gift comes with a written gift agreement specifying how funds will be used, what outcomes you should expect, and how we will report back to you. Charity Navigator independently calculated our 81.41% program expense ratio from our most recent IRS Form 990.
Yes. We honor all requests for anonymity fully and without question.
We work with donors individually. We understand that circumstances change and we will always find a solution together.
Absolutely. We work directly with foundations, donor-advised funds, and estate planners. We provide all documentation needed.
It varies. Some gifts close in days; complex planned gifts may take longer. We move at your pace, not ours.
You receive a written acknowledgment, a gift agreement, and regular updates about the programs your gift supports. Your relationship with CII deepens, not ends.
Working with an advisor or attorney?
Many of our largest gifts arrive through a financial advisor, estate planner, or family office. We work directly with your team with the discretion your clients expect. We can provide EIN documentation, sample bequest language, wire instructions, audited financials, and anything else you need.
