· Private foundation
Rocky Nook Foundation
Its FY2025 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 FY2021–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k10 grants · $50k
- $10k–50k5 grants · $50k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| NANTUCKET BEHAVIORAL HEALTH CENTER | $10,001 |
| NEW CANAAN LIBRARY | $10,000 |
| NEW YORK CITY BALLET | $10,000 |
| GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY | $10,000 |
| STAMFORD HOSPITAL FOUNDATION | $10,000 |
| FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH OF NEW CANAAN | $7,500 |
| DEERFIELD ACADEMY | $7,500 |
| OHIO WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY | $7,500 |
| US SQUASH | $5,000 |
| CROSSING THRESHOLDS | $5,000 |
| STANFORD FUND | $5,000 |
| STANFORD UNIVERSITY | $5,000 |
| YOUTH ORCHESTRA WITHOUT BORDERS | $5,000 |
| CITY SQUASH | $1,500 |
| MEALS-ON-WHEELS OF NEW CANAAN | $1,000 |
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.
Your human-services grants (FY22–22, $2k) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 100% 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.
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.
12 repeat relationships — 11 still active in FY2025, 1 since wound down; 2 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (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 FY2025, 86% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $13k 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
GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY4× · 2022–2025 · $260k · revenue +16%- NYNEW YORK CITY BALLET INC3× · 2023–2025 · $20k · revenue +32%
- NCNew Canaan Nature Center Association Inc2× · 2023–2024 · $2k · revenue +4%
Funded once
- UNUSS NANTUCKET COMMISSIONING COMMITTEEone grant, 2023 · $10k
- PAPOETS AND WRITERS INCone grant, 2023 · $3k · revenue +7%
- GHGREAT HARBOR YACHT CLUB INCone grant, 2023 · $3k · revenue +19%
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.
Western new england university, a comprehensive private institution with a tradition of excellence in teaching and scholarship and a commitment to service, awards undergraduate, master's, and doctoral degrees in various departments from…
The masters school celebrates active participation, deep understanding, and meaningful connection. a community of diverse individuals, we gather to learn, to strive, to dare, to do - to be a power for good in the world.
Manhattan school of music is deeply committed to excellence in education, performance, and creative activity; to the humanity of the school's environment; and to the cultural enrichment of the larger community. a premiere international…
To educate students in the liberal arts through free inquiry and the open exchange of ideas.when grinnell college framed its charter in the iowa territory of the united states in 1846, it set forth a mission to educate its students "for…
Nyu is a private university with approximately 60,000 matriculating students in 20 schools and institutes. nyu's primary missions are education, research and scholarship, and patient care.
The institute for advanced study (the institute) is one of the world's leading centers for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. see schedule o.
Fairleigh dickinson university is a center of academic excellence dedicated to the preparation of world citizens through global education. the university strives to provide students with the multi-disciplinary, intercultural, and ethical…
Lewis & clark is a premier private higher education institution offering an exceptional education in an inclusive environment. by fostering critical thinking, innovation, creativity, civic engagement, and leadership, both inside and…
Georgian court university (gcu), provides a comprehensive liberal arts education and is open to students of all faiths, delivers a curriculum that promotes scholarship, service, and personal development.
Wesleyan university is dedicated to providing an education in liberal arts by building a diverse, energetic community of students, faculty, and staff who value independence of mind and generosity of spirit. see additional description in…
Unite goodness and knowledge and inspire youth from every quarter to lead purposeful lives. [text in quotations is taken from the academy's deed of gift, drafted in 1781] knowledge and goodness "above all, it is expected that the attention…
Saint ann's exists to nurture the wonder of children. unfettered by grades, teachers and students embark on journeys of discovery in which the arts are central. through an ambitious curriculum and a culture of inquiry, we question the…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Georgetown University and the most unlike its peers is Meals-On-Wheels of New Canaan Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
14 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. 14 of the 21 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 GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds THE NEW CANAAN LIBRARY INC ↗
- Who funds TRUSTEES OF DEERFIELD ACADEMY ↗
- Who funds NEW YORK CITY BALLET INC ↗
- Who funds THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF THE LELAND STANFORD JUNIOR UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds OHIO WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds City Squash Inc ↗
- Who funds MEALS-ON-WHEELS OF NEW CANAAN INC ↗
- Who funds CROSSING THRESHOLDS INC ↗
- Who funds POETS AND WRITERS INC ↗
- Who funds GREAT HARBOR YACHT CLUB INC ↗
- Who funds New Canaan Nature Center Association Inc ↗
- Who funds SQUASH HAVEN INC ↗
- Who funds NEW CANAAN CARES INC ↗
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: O'Connor Family Foundation · National Philanthropic Trust · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation
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 Rocky Nook 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, a single department, or state — and drag the year to watch it move.
- Squash Haven Inc — 4% 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 Rocky Nook Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Rocky Nook 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.