· Public charity
Shared Ascent Fund
SHARED ASCENT FUND's mission is to promote the common good by upholding democratic values, promoting health, and advancing social equity.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2020–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- $50k–250k3 grants · $500k
- $250k+3 grants · $750k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| CITIZENS FOR RESPONSIBILITY AND ETHICS IN WASHINGTON INC | $250,000 |
| VOTER REGISTRATION PROJECT | $250,000 |
| CAMPAIGN LEGAL CENTER INC | $250,000 |
| ALL VOTING IS LOCAL | $200,000 |
| CONSTITUTIONAL ACCOUNTABILITY CENTER | $200,000 |
| LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE EDUCATION FUND INC | $100,000 |
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 (FY20–24) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 95% 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.
6 repeat relationships — 5 still active in FY2024, 1 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (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 FY2024, 84% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $200k 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
- CFCITIZENS FOR RESPONSIBILITY AND ETHICS IN WASHINGTON INC4× · 2021–2024 · $675k · revenue +47%
- VRVOTER REGISTRATION PROJECT3× · 2020–2024 · $475k · revenue +35%
- AAASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE - AAJC INC2× · 2022–2023 · $125k · revenue +13%
Funded once
- AFAB FOUNDATIONgraduatedone grant, 2021 · $1.5M · revenue +651%
- DJDEMAND JUSTICE INITIATIVEgraduatedone grant, 2022 · $1.5M · revenue +96% · 39% of their budget
- TATHE AMERICAN INDEPENDENT FOUNDATIONgraduatedone grant, 2021 · $400k · revenue ×12
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.
Preservation of civil liberties through litigation and public education.
The foundation works to defend and promote the constitution of the united states, focusing especially on the first, fourth, fifth, sixth, eighth, and 14th amendments. the foundation also works to defend and promote the constitution of the…
To provide at no cost legal assistance to veterans of the u.s. armed forces and current service members.
The american constitution society for law and policy (acs) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, non-partisan legal organization. through a diverse nationwide network of progressive lawyers, law students, judges, scholars, advocates, and many others,…
To advance economic and social liberties and a free enterprise society through strategic litigation, training, communication, activism and research. in addition, the center will train law students, lawyers and policy activists in the…
Organize general election presidential and vice-presidential debates
The union works to advocate and advance a public policy agenda to support and protect the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of iowa. it works to maintain throughout the united states the rights of free…
Amazon conservation unites science, people, and innovation to protect the amazon - the greatest wild forest on earth. as guardians of the most iconic forest on the planet, we bring together the power of the latest science and technology…
Council for court excellence's (cce's) mission is to bring people together to conduct research, educate, and advocate to make d.c.'s unique legal systems more just, equitable, and accountable to the community.
Ala is the catalyst for growth by providing: diverse educational experiences, engaged peer communities, strategic solutions, dynamic resources, and trusted networks.
Providing research, education and practical information all aimed at optimizing newspapers' business operations, deepening their community engagement and enhancing the quality of their journalism.
The american arbitration association ("aaa") is dedicated to effective, efficient and economical methods of dispute resolution through education, technology and solutions-oriented service.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Asian Americans Advancing Justice - Aajc Inc and the most unlike its peers is Pushblack. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
Your grantees are a median of 16 years old; the field is 21. You back the younger end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 18% startups (under 5 years old) — 4% of your grantees by number, and just 2% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 12% 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.
24 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. 24 of the 25 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 CAMPAIGN LEGAL CENTER INC ↗
- Who funds AB FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds DEMAND JUSTICE INITIATIVE ↗
- Who funds THE LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE EDUCATION FUND INC ↗
- Who funds CITIZENS FOR RESPONSIBILITY AND ETHICS IN WASHINGTON INC ↗
- Who funds CONSTITUTIONAL ACCOUNTABILITY CENTER ↗
- Who funds VOTER REGISTRATION PROJECT ↗
- Who funds THE AMERICAN INDEPENDENT FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds THE UNION OF CONCERNED SCIENTISTS INC ↗
- Who funds INDIVISIBLE CIVICS ↗
- Who funds ALL VOTING IS LOCAL ↗
- Who funds PRIORITIES USA FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law ↗
- Who funds PROTECT DEMOCRACY PROJECT ↗
- Who funds WILLIAM J BRENNAN CENTER FOR JUSTICE INC ↗
- Who funds LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS EDUCATION FUND ↗
- Who funds ASIAN AMERICANS ADVANCING JUSTICE - AAJC INC ↗
- Who funds ADVANCE DEMOCRACY INC ↗
- Who funds CENTER FOR TECHNOLOGY AND CIVIC LIFE ↗
- Who funds ISSUE ONE ↗
- Who funds PUSHBLACK ↗
- Who funds RESOURCES LEGACY FUND ↗
- Who funds Amalgamated Charitable Foundation Inc ↗
- Who funds LOYOLA MARYMOUNT UNIVERSITY ↗
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: New Venture Fund · Tides Foundation · Silicon Valley Community Foundation · Impactassetsinc · Resources Legacy Fund · Wellspring Philanthropic Fund Inc · Foundation to Promote Open Society · Hopewell Fund · Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco the Peninsula Marin & Sonoma · Amalgamated Charitable Foundation Inc · The San Francisco Foundation · Gs Donor Advised Philanthropy Fund for Wealth Management Inc
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 Shared Ascent 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.
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.