· Private foundation
Hellman Fellows Fund
Its FY2020 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 FY2017–2020.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| UC San Diego Foundation | $12,457,472 |
| UC Berkeley Foundation | $9,650,000 |
| UCLA Foundation | $7,800,000 |
| Hellman Foundation | $7,417,863 |
| UC Davis Foundation | $6,250,000 |
| University of California RegentsIrvine | $6,000,000 |
| UC Santa Barbara Foundation | $5,725,000 |
| UC Riverside Foundation | $5,200,000 |
| Regents - University of California Merced | $3,700,000 |
| UC Santa Cruz Foundation | $3,650,000 |
| Regents of the University of California | $750,000 |
| American Academy of Arts & Sciences | $600,000 |
| UCSF Foundation | $500,000 |
| Regents - University of California Irvine | $250,000 |
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.
Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY17–20) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 99% of your 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.
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 +66% since the first grant, against 0% for the ones you funded once.
11 repeat relationships — 10 still active in FY2020, 1 since wound down; 3 grantees were first funded in FY2020 (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 FY2020, 78% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $14M 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
- USUC SAN DIEGO FOUNDATION4× · 2017–2020 · $14M · revenue +78%
- TUTHE UC DAVIS FOUNDATION4× · 2017–2020 · $7.0M · revenue +66%
UC SANTA BARBARA FOUNDATION4× · 2017–2020 · $6.4M · revenue +224%
Funded once
- HFHELLMAN FOUNDATIONone grant, 2020 · $7.4M · revenue -69%
- ROREGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT IRVINEone grant, 2020 · $6.0M
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN FRANCISCO FOUNDATIONone grant, 2020 · $500k · revenue 0%
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.
The organization provides professional investment management services for endowed gifts and financial assets entrusted to the ucsf foundation.
The university of california press foundation (incorporated in 1981) is dedicated to raising philanthropic support and community visibility to ensure the long-term sustainability of uc press.
The mission of the university of california, irvine foundation (uc irvine foundation) is to raise and manage private funds to support uc irvine's broader mission of excellence in teaching, research and public service. to this end, the uc…
To advance the academic and reputational success of uc college of the law, san francisco ("the college") through collaborative and impactful fundraising initiatives.
To further the scientific, literary, educational and charitable purposes of california state university, monterey bay, including fundraising, development, endowment management, financial assistance, public relations and other support.
The uc merced foundation was formed for the purpose of encouraging voluntary private gifts, trusts, and bequests for the benefit of the university of california, merced.
Raise private resources to advance the mission and priorities of the university and serve as ambassadors in the community. provide stewardship in the prudent investment of resources and ensure the integrity of the foundation through…
To support the scientific and educational purposes of the regents of the university of california (the "university"), in its specific capacity as manager and operator of the lawrence berkeley national laboratory and to carry on other…
To accept and manage restricted and unrestricted gifts benefiting california state university east bay. additionally, the trustees support the university through advocacy, development, personal contributions and counsel to the university's…
Established in 1962, the foundation is the central foundation for the california state university (csu) system and serves the office of the chancellor. the foundation exists to support excellence in teaching and learning, and to serve the…
To support and further the research, education and community service objectives of san diego state university.
To advance the educational, cultural, scholarly, and creative activities and the role of community service of csula by increasing private funding, responsibly managing donated resources and supporting the university and its diverse and…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Uc Santa Barbara Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Hellman Foundation. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
9 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.
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 2017–2025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 9 of the 15 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 UC SAN DIEGO FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds UCLA FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds HELLMAN FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds THE UC DAVIS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds UC SANTA BARBARA FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds UC RIVERSIDE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds UC SANTA CRUZ FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS & SCIENCES ↗
- Who funds UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN FRANCISCO FOUNDATION ↗
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Hellman Fellows Fund 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.
- American Academy of Arts & Sciences — 3% 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 Hellman Fellows Fund?
Find your warmest path to Hellman Fellows Fund 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.