· Private foundation
Adams Cowan Foundation
Its FY2026 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2026.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2026
- Under $10k38 grants · $97k
- $10k–50k3 grants · $30k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| SMITH COLLEGE | $10,000 |
| MARTHA'S VINEYARD FISHERMEN'S PERSE | $10,000 |
| PARTNERSHIP FOR LOS ANGELES SCHOOLS | $10,000 |
| AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS SCIENCES | $7,000 |
| UCLA DEVELOPMENT | $6,500 |
| Alliance for Children's Right | $5,000 |
| COMMON SENSE MEDIA | $5,000 |
| UC MERCED | $5,000 |
| INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S MEDIA FOUNDAT | $5,000 |
| BLUEDOT INSTITUTE | $5,000 |
| Muse Ique | $5,000 |
| The Center for Early Education | $3,500 |
| Individual grant recipient | $3,500 |
| LA THEATRE WORKS | $2,500 |
| THE LEONARD I BEERMAN FOUNDATION | $2,500 |
Do your dollars go where the need is?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, then read against the area’s typical level.
Your human-services grants (FY18–26, $24k) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 69% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty linein the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP; grantee ZIP can differ from where services are delivered.
Which US states your grants reach
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are actually delivered. Need from public data — U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.
Who you back again
Which organizations you funded more than once, and which you funded a single time. Each grantee is matched to its own filings.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +25% since the first grant, against +16% for the ones you funded once.
55 repeat relationships — 26 still active in FY2026, 29 since wound down; 13 grantees were first funded in FY2026 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Median revenue growth · since first grant
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2026, 76% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $29k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
First-time = a grantee’s first year in your filing window; renewed = funded in an earlier year too. As a portfolio matures the renewed share naturally climbs — once funded, an org stays “renewable” — so the signal is the years that buck it (a new-grantee intake wave). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as “new.” Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.
Backed again, and grew
- AFALLIANCE FOR CHILDREN'S RIGHTS7× · 2018–2026 · $25k · revenue +129%
- CSCOMMON SENSE MEDIA8× · 2017–2026 · $24k · revenue +80%
- PFPARTNERSHIP FOR LOS ANGELES SCHOOLS8× · 2017–2026 · $24k · revenue +112%
Funded once
- UOUNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA BERKELEYone grant, 2024 · $10k
- DHDIDI HIRSCH COMM MENTAL HEALTone grant, 2020 · $5k
- CSCALIFORNIA SCIENCE CENTER FOUNDATIONone grant, 2024 · $5k · revenue -34%
Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.
The map has a center of gravity: the average direction from the rest of the sector toward the organizations the foundation funds — the shape of its giving. Scoring every nonprofit along that direction surfaces the ones that look most like the portfolio. These are the closest matchesthat aren’t grantees — a resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
California western school of law is an independent, aba/aals and wasc senior college and university commission (wscuc) accredited s.d. law school that prepares graduates for the practice of law through a carefully sequenced program of…
The association serves its members by creating resources that enable california school administrators to develop and apply creative leadership and management skills and in turn, improve the educational process for all students.
To distribute public affairs and other educational information in order to create an electronic bridge between californians and their public officials, and, in the process educate a new generation of voting citizens and civic leaders who…
The organization is a non-partisan, membership based speakers' forum that connects business leaders, community members, and engaged individuals with shared interest in local, national, and global affairs. it provides an open and accessible…
Ca fwd drives action to identify solutions that can be taken to scale to meet the challenges the state is facing. the organization is driven by the belief that regional solutions across the state will help ensure economic, environmental,…
The Television Academy is dedicated to celebrating excellence, innovation and the advancement of the telecommunications arts and sciences through recognition, education and leadership, while fostering a diverse, inclusive and accessible…
Meeting the professional needs of los angeles lawyers, and improving the administration of justice.
Arts for la leads communities, artists and organizations to advocate for an equitable, healthy, and creative los angeles region through the arts.
The university of la verne offers a distinctive and relevant educational experience to a diverse population of traditional-age, adult, and graduate learners, preparing them for successful careers and a commitment to lifelong learning…
The AIA California, in collaboration with local components, is the voice of the architectural profession.
The league of california community foundations promotes and strengthens community foundations in california. through collaboration and shared learning among member foundations and building partnerships with private and public entities, we…
The california dental association is committed to the success of our members in service to their patients and the public.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is California Community Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Community Reflections Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
For each theme you fund, this compares how the sector’s money is shifting with how your own giving is shifting.
Sector change and giving change are each shown relative to their own range, growing (right) or shrinking (left); both normalized, so inflation isn’t mistaken for growth.
Your grantees are a median of 33 years old; the field is 14. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 24% startups (under 5 years old) — 8% of your grantees by number, and just 8% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 2% lost their exemption, against 14% of the field you don’t fund.
Age = years since IRS exemption (a founding proxy). “Closed” = auto-revocation for 3 years of non-filing — a floor on closure, not proof, and bigger established orgs lapse least. Association, not causation.
92 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2026.
Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue from every source. Association, dated; never a causal claim.
Counted here: distinct organizations you funded across 2017–2026, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 92 of the 140 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile; the rest are funded organizations whose filings we could not track year by year.
Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee
Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing
Go grantee by grantee — a decade per org, and how each moved after you funded them
A decade per grantee — revenue shaded, your grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
- Who funds THE RAPE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds UCLA FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds THE CENTER FOR EARLY EDUCATION ↗
- Who funds ALLIANCE FOR CHILDREN'S RIGHTS ↗
- Who funds COMMON SENSE MEDIA ↗
- Who funds PARTNERSHIP FOR LOS ANGELES SCHOOLS ↗
- Who funds FACING HISTORY & OURSELVES INC ↗
- Who funds MARCH FOR OUR LIVES FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS & SCIENCES ↗
- Who funds CALIFORNIA ART CLUB ↗
- Who funds HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH INC ↗
- Who funds BLUEDOT INSTITUTE INC ↗
- Who funds MuseIque ↗
- Who funds THE TRUSTEES OF THE SMITH COLLEGE ↗
- Who funds CATALYST CALIFORNIA ↗
- Who funds L A THEATRE WORKS ↗
- Who funds Cambodian Childrens Fund ↗
- Who funds THE PASADENA PLAYHOUSE STATE THEATRE OF CALIFORNIA INC ↗
- Who funds Children's Hospital Los Angeles ↗
- Who funds MARLBOROUGH SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds THE MAYOR'S FUND FOR LOS ANGELES ↗
- Who funds The George Washington University ↗
- Who funds MARTHA'S VINEYARD COMMUNITY SERVICES INC ↗
- Who funds THE ARCHER SCHOOL FOR GIRLS INC ↗
- Who funds CALIFORNIA SCIENCE CENTER FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds CHOATE ROSEMARY HALL FOUNDATION INCORPORATED ↗
- Who funds CHILDREN'S DEFENSE FUND ↗
- Who funds FEMINIST MAJORITY FOUNDATION ↗
The grantmakers whose grantees overlap with yours far more than size alone predicts. Each orbits closer the stronger the alignment; the arcs between them show where they also fund each other. Here it reads as a tightly interlocked camp — most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: Weingart Foundation · California Community Foundation · The Ralph M Parsons Foundation · The Ahmanson Foundation · The Annenberg Foundation · The California Wellness Foundation · The California Endowment · The Unger Family Foundation · The Katie McGrath & Jj Abrams Family Foundation · Liberty Hill Foundation · Adams Fund · Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. A research starting point: overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Adams Cowan Foundation funds. Left–right is the share of its income from government; up–down is the share from you. Bigger dots raise more. Filter to federal or a single department — and drag the year to watch it move.
- Empower Her Network Inc Dba Empowered Network — 47% of income from government
- Greater Lowell Community Foundation Inc — 18% of income from government
- Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program Inc — 8% of income from government
- American Academy of Arts & Sciences — 3% of income from government
- Martha's Vineyard Community Services Inc — 3% of income from government
- The Trustees of the Smith College — 1% of income from government
- Choate Rosemary Hall Foundation Incorporated — 0% of income from government
Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending — grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check: a grantee that reports government grants we could not trace to a source is left off the chart rather than shown as receiving none. An association, not a claim that your grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first — a floor, not a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12–24 months.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Adams Cowan Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Adams Cowan Foundation through trustees and officers whose names appear on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the shortest route it can evidence.
Each link is a name appearing on two organizations’ public IRS 990 filings, matched on that name and, where the filings support it, on location. A same-state match has geographic support, which is a second matching feature rather than confirmation that the two are one person; a cross-state one is the likeliest to be two people who share a name. Every hop shows its tier, low-confidence and distant paths are held back rather than guessed, and it is worth confirming the person before you use the introduction.