Happy New Year, from YouthBridge Community Foundation of Greater St. Louis!

Conversations with many of our community partners have brought to light a common sentiment: 2024 was a whirlwind of a year! With all the changes we have witnessed in our region and our world, we rest assured that one thing remains constant at YouthBridge—our core purpose of Connecting Resources and Community Needs.

Before we delve into all the excitement that 2025 will surely bring, we take a moment to pause and reflect on 2024.

Last year, we continued to build upon pivotal projects and relationships that were started at the tail-end of the prior year. Some hallmarks included:

• Growing partnerships with organizations such as Gateway Children’s Charity and Progress 64 West. YouthBridge continues to manage all aspects of the grant and scholarship programs for these groups, allowing them to focus on growing record-breaking resources to support youth.
• Fueling collaboration and capacity by providing resources for projects that allowed several nonprofit agencies to work together.
• Expanding meaningful financial investment in the St. Louis community by increasing Impact Investments with the St. Louis Community Credit Union, bringing our total community investments to nearly $3,000,000.
• Embarking on two new fiscal sponsorship relationships, helping community leaders grow financial resources to create a strong foundation for new nonprofit agencies that will be introduced to the community soon.
• Significantly increasing grant awards to agencies across the region by serving as an effective resource for our generous fundholders.

In 2024, we were honored once again to be ranked 14th on the St. Louis Business Journal’s list of “Largest Charitable Trusts and Foundations.” Public recognition is never our motivation, however, this achievement is indicative of what we hope our supporters feel everyday—our commitment to helping increase the ease and impact of philanthropy for the benefit of our fundholders and agency partners, and ultimately, for the benefit of the bi-state Metro Area.

In 2025, YouthBridge is setting out to build momentum, nurturing resources and relationships to grow our reach and impact. One way we seek to nurture existing relationships is to shine more light on them. This year, in our monthly newsletters, we will include the “Agency Spotlight,” a new segment that will feature wonderful local organizations that have endowment funds at YouthBridge. We support these organizations behind the scenes by providing vehicles for them to grow their financial sustainability, and we want to provide a larger platform for them to share important updates and news about how their missions have been improving our region.

We thank you, our community partners and supporters, for a tremendous 2024, and we invite you to join us in creating an even more impactful 2025. We can and will grow together!