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Search for Common Ground at a glanceMostly funded, not a grantmaker: see who funds it →

· Public charity

Search for Common Ground

Our mission is to transform the way the world deals with conflict, away from adversarial approaches and toward cooperative solutions.

$7.8M
Granted FY2024still arriving
9
Grants FY2024still arriving
7
States reached
$1.5M
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its granteesRead
04Its fieldRead
01What it funds
01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2022 to 2024.

Crime & Legal$3.1MCommunity Improvement$537kInternational$393kCivil Rights$292kPhilanthropy$270kYouth Development$180kEducation$159kPublic Benefit$100k
02FY2024 · 9 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

How this is measured
The 9 grants below total $2,535,823, the rows itemized in this filing. The $7,847,549 headline is the total grant expense on the return; the other $5,311,726 is giving the schedule does not break out (grants under the $5,000 itemization floor, grants to individuals, grants on other schedules). Every figure below describes the itemized rows only.

By grant size · FY2024

  • $10k–50k2 grants · $49k
  • $50k–250k5 grants · $694k
  • $250k+2 grants · $1.8M
$138,749
Median grant
7
States reached
$18M
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
American Bar Association$1,522,513
The Hopewell Fund$270,000
Plessy & Ferguson Initiative$211,612
SOLIYA Inc$180,000
Multi-Faith Neighbors Network$138,749
HOW TO BUILD UP INC$88,968
New Lines Inst for Strategy & Policy LLC$75,000
Committee of Seventy$24,500
Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice$24,481
02The need
03

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Dollar for dollar, its grants (FY22–24) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 96% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 10%HOW TO BUILD UP INC: $89k → 10%Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice: $24k → 11%SOLIYA Inc: $180k → 17%Multi-Faith Neighbors Network: $296k → 11%Multi-Faith Neighbors Network: $102k → 11%AMERICAN UNIVERSITY: $124k → 14%American Bar Association: $1.6M → 14%Everyday Peace Indicators: $141k → 7%Plessy & Ferguson Initiative: $212k → 23%HOW TO BUILD UP INC: $20k → 10%Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice: $13k → 11%Multi-Faith Neighbors Network: $139k → 11%Grameen Foundation USA: $88k → 14%American Bar Association: $1.5M → 14%Everyday Peace Indicators: $55k → 7%Plessy & Ferguson Initiative: $35k → 23%Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice (Kroc IPJ): $7k → 11%American University: $35k → 14%The Hopewell Fund: $270k → 14%New Lines Inst for Strategy & Policy LLC: $75k → 14%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount
How this is measured
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.

Which US states its grants reach

IL
NY
PA
CA
VA
DC
LA
TX

Grants abroad, by region: $4.2M on the FY2024 return

Schedule F, as filed: 7 regions. The IRS asks for region and purpose, not the recipient, so no country or grantee can be named here.

Sub-Saharan Africa$2.1M · 49% · 46 grants

Stated purpose: To implement project activities

Russia and Neighboring States$726k · 17% · 20 grants

Stated purpose: To implement project activities

Middle East and North Africa$629k · 15% · 4 grants

Stated purpose: To implement project activities

South America$275k · 7% · 5 grants

Stated purpose: To implement project activities

South Asia$193k · 5% · 3 grants

Stated purpose: To implement project activities

East Asia and the Pacific$181k · 4% · 4 grants

Stated purpose: To implement project activities

Europe (including Iceland and Greenland)$125k · 3% · 2 grants

Stated purpose: To implement project activities

How this is measured
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving. Grants abroad on Schedule F are filed by region, purpose and amount with no recipient name, so they are shown by region and cannot be placed on the country map or matched to a grantee.
03Its grantees
repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

92%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.
$4.4M · 7 repeat orgs$367k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +38% since the first grant, against -19% for those funded once.

7 repeat relationships: 5 still active in FY2024, 2 since wound down; 3 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

7
1

Total granted

$4.4M
$88k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+38%
-19%

Still filing today

100%
100%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 88% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $280k went to new ones.

50%100%’22’23’24
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’22’23’24
Civil RightsCommunity ImprovementInternationalEducationOther
How this is measured
First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). 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

  • AB
    American Bar Association
    2× · 2023–2024 · $3.1M · revenue +54%
  • MN
    Multi-Faith Neighbors Network
    3× · 2022–2024 · $537k · revenue +38% · 53% of their budget
  • HT
    HOW TO BUILD UP INC
    2× · 2023–2024 · $109k · revenue +155%

Funded once

  • GF
    GRAMEEN FOUNDATION USA
    one grant, 2023 · $88k · revenue -19%
How this is measured

Repeat means funded in two or more distinct years. Growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Its field

Closest unfunded matches

The nonprofits that most resemble its grantees but are not funded by it, scored along the direction from the rest of the field toward the portfolio. A resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.

1
Institute for State Effectiveness

The institute for state effectiveness seeks to close the governance gap and advance inclusive growth so that states and markets deliver to citizens. ise advances practical approaches to strengthen capacity for transformation, through…

International
2
Meedan Inc

To strengthen journalism, digital literacy and information accessibility for global communities.

Science & Tech
3
Pew Research Center

Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan "fact tank" that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world. Pew Research Center generates a foundation of facts that enriches the public dialogue and…

Social Science
4
The George Washington University

The mission of the george washington university (gw) is to educate individuals in liberal arts, languages, sciences, learned professions, and other courses and subjects of study, and to conduct scholarly research and publish the findings…

Education
5
The Conversationalist
—
6
Golden Gate University

Golden gate university prepares individuals to lead and serve by providing high quality, practice-based educational programs in law, taxation, business and related professions - as a nonprofit institution - in an innovative and challenging…

Education
7
Fielding Graduate University

We provide exemplary interdisciplinary programs for a community of scholar-practitioners within a distributed learning model grounded in student-driven inquiry and leading to enhanced knowledge.

—
8
Third Way

To research and develop centrist policy ideas.

Civil Rights
9
CarbonPlan

Improving the transparency and scientific integrity of climate solutions through open data and tools.

Environment
10
Parliamentarians for Global Action

Parliamentarians for global action (pga) is a non-partisan ngo network of legislators from all regions of the world acting in their individual capacity to advocate for human rights, democracy, and the rule of law; peace and human security;…

International
11
The Fund for Peace Inc

Building bridges across diverse sectors, and developing innovative technologies and tools for policy makers. a leader in the conflict assessment and early warning field, the fund for peace focuses on the problems of weak and failing…

International
12
ReThink Media

We strengthen groups collaborative media and communications capacity, increase the voiceshare of advocates, experts, and community spokespeople, and provide in-depth media, messaging, and opinion research to advance effective organizing…

Education
How this is measured
The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is How to Build Up Inc; the most unlike its peers is Plessy & Ferguson Initiative. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
04the grantee network

11 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.

Each grant beside the grantee’s revenue from every source, year by year.

How this is measured

Counted here: distinct organizations funded across 2017 to 2025, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 11 of the 12 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile.

Each grantee is resolved to its own IRS returns. Association, dated; never a causal claim.

2
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
2
Early backer (in before they grew)
11/11
Grantees still filing
5/11
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

American Bar Association: $3,104,253 · OtherAmerican Bar Association+2 more: $119,982 · OtherMulti-Faith Neighbors Network: $536,909 · Community ImprovementMulti-Faith Ne…HOW TO BUILD UP INC: $108,968 · Community ImprovementHOW TO BUILD U…PLESSY & FERGUSON INITIATIVE: $247,041 · Civil RightsPLESSY & F…Everyday Peace Indicators: $195,997 · Civil RightsEveryday P…COMMITTEE OF SEVENTY: $24,500 · Civil RightsHOPEWELL FUND: $270,000 · PhilanthropySoliya Inc: $180,000 · InternationalGRAMEEN FOUNDATION USA: $87,795 · InternationalAMERICAN UNIVERSITY: $158,891 · Education
Other$3,224,235Community Improvement$645,877Civil Rights$467,538Philanthropy$270,000International$267,795Education$158,891

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetAmerican Bar Association: $3,104,253 over 2y, 1.5% of budgetMulti-Faith Neighbors Network: $536,909 over 3y, 53% of budgetHOPEWELL FUND: $270,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetPLESSY & FERGUSON INITIATIVE: $247,041 over 2y, 92% of budgetEveryday Peace Indicators: $195,997 over 2y, 20% of budgetSoliya Inc: $180,000 over 1y, 7.9% of budgetAMERICAN UNIVERSITY: $158,891 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetHOW TO BUILD UP INC: $108,968 over 2y, 2.2% of budgetGRAMEEN FOUNDATION USA: $87,795 over 1y, 0.8% of budgetUNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO: $44,982 over 3y, 0.0% of budgetCOMMITTEE OF SEVENTY: $24,500 over 1y, 0.8% of budget
Grantee by grantee: a decade per organization, before and after funding

A decade per grantee: revenue shaded, grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization Search for Common Ground funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Search for Common Ground. Bigger dots raise more.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 00%6%25%56%100%funder's share of their income ↑0%3%5%8%10%share of the org’s income from government →
    no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
    0get no government money at all
    2report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
    0rely on government for over half their income
    ⤢ axis zoomed · 0–10%
    typical government reliance, FY20–25
    How this is measured
    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 a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than 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 to 24 months.

    On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 12 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

    How this is measured
    Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears.

    Generated from the IRS Form 990 e-file return for fiscal year 2024, released 2024. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

    Source object · view filing

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    More from the funding graph

    The unnamed billions
    grants reported with no recipient in the public record
    The regranting layer
    51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer
    The DAF merry-go-round
    $9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds
    The endowment market
    who holds foundation money, and what just moved
    The camps
    funders cluster by geography, not ideology
    By state
    where grant money is based, and what stays home