Skip to content

Minnesota · Private foundation

Shepherd Charitable Trust

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.

$210k
Granted FY2025(still arriving)
8
Grants FY2025
10
Organizations funded FY2024
40%
First-time grantees FY2024
Read the full brief
Median grant, FY2025
$25,000
Largest grant, FY2025
$50,000
Organizations funded a year
5 to 10
FY2018 to FY2024
States reached, FY2025
5
Total assets, FY2025
$5.0M
Applications
Preselected organizations only
Per its most recent filing; check its own site

How open it is to new grantees

In FY2024, 40% of the organizations Shepherd Charitable Trust funded were first-time grantees, receiving 15% of its grant dollars.

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 85% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $33k went to new ones.

50%100%’18’19’20’21’22’23’24
RenewedFirst-time

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

’18’19’20’21’22’23’24
Public BenefitAnimalsEducationHealthCommunity ImprovementCrime & LegalOther
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.
The numbers by year
Fiscal yearOrganizations fundedTo those organizationsFirst-time grantees
FY2025still arriving7$185k29%
FY202410$213k40%
FY202310$213k60%
FY20228$237k13%
FY20219$216k56%
FY20207$140k57%
FY20195$146k60%
FY20185$73k80%
93% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.

Religion$517kEducation$347kPublic Benefit$145kRecreation & Sports$125kHealth$98kAnimals$49kHuman Services$29kCommunity Improvement$20kOther$0

Top grantees

Largest recipients by total granted, FY2017 to FY2025, and the share of each one’s budget the grants supplied at peak.

GranteeTotal grantedYearsShare of their budget
University of Minnesota Foundation$250,00030%
Minnesota Iowa Baptist Conference$125,0003n/a
Barry Goldwater Institute for Public Policy Research$70,00030%
N C Little Memorial Hospice Inc$50,50041%
Judicial Watch Inc$50,00020%
Turning Point USA Inc$25,00010%
Arizona Humane Society$25,0001n/a
Cars Against Crime Inc$20,000217%
Benedictine Health Center$20,00010%
Injured Police Officers Fund$15,00022%
Show all 17 grantees
All grantees of Shepherd Charitable Trust by total granted
GranteeTotal grantedYearsShare of their budget
University of Minnesota Foundation$250,00030%
Minnesota Iowa Baptist Conference$125,0003n/a
Barry Goldwater Institute for Public Policy Research$70,00030%
N C Little Memorial Hospice Inc$50,50041%
Judicial Watch Inc$50,00020%
Turning Point USA Inc$25,00010%
Arizona Humane Society$25,0001n/a
Cars Against Crime Inc$20,000217%
Benedictine Health Center$20,00010%
Injured Police Officers Fund$15,00022%
American Kennel Club Canine Health Foundation$10,00010%
Benilde St Margarets High School$10,0001n/a
Retired Paws$5,00019%
Sacred Heart of Jesus$2,0001n/a
Happy Tails Rescue Foundation$2,00020%
Hospice of the Valley$1,00010%
Greater Lake Sylvia Association Inc$1,00011%

What it could do for these grantees

Plus 13 recipients with no EIN on record ($761k), not named here.

Where it is load-bearing

Each grantee by its size and the share of its budget Shepherd Charitable Trust supplied at peak.

25%50%75%100%$100k$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetUniversity of Minnesota Foundation: $250,000 over 3y, 0.0% of budgetBarry Goldwater Institute for Public Policy Research: $70,000 over 3y, 0.2% of budgetN C Little Memorial Hospice Inc: $50,500 over 4y, 0.9% of budgetJudicial Watch Inc: $50,000 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetTurning Point USA Inc: $25,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetCars Against Crime Inc: $20,000 over 2y, 17% of budgetBenedictine Health Center: $20,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetInjured Police Officers Fund: $15,000 over 2y, 1.6% of budgetAmerican Kennel Club Canine Health Foundation: $10,000 over 1y, 0.2% of budgetRetired Paws: $5,000 over 1y, 9.2% of budgetHappy Tails Rescue Foundation: $2,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetHospice of the Valley: $1,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetGreater Lake Sylvia Association Inc: $1,000 over 1y, 0.7% of budget

Tap a dot to name the grantee.

How this is measured
Share of budget is the funder’s grant in a year over the grantee’s total revenue that year, at its highest across the years we hold; revenue is from all sources. Only grantees confirmed against their own filings, whose grants do not exceed their revenue, are plotted: the largest 13.

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.

Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust IncIN8.2× affinity4 shared granteesties to 6 of 6Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: 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

How this is measured
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

Compare Shepherd Charitable Trust with peer funders

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Shepherd Charitable Trust?

Find your warmest path to Shepherd Charitable Trust 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.

About Shepherd Charitable Trust

How much does Shepherd Charitable Trust give?
Shepherd Charitable Trust reported 8 grants totaling $210,000 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 5 and 10 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.
What does Shepherd Charitable Trust fund?
By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are Religion (34%), Education (23%), Public Benefit (9%).
Who are Shepherd Charitable Trust's largest grantees?
By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: University of Minnesota Foundation ($250k), Minnesota Iowa Baptist Conference ($125k), Barry Goldwater Institute for Public Policy Research ($70k).
Does Shepherd Charitable Trust fund new organizations?
In FY2024, 40% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
Does Shepherd Charitable Trust accept unsolicited applications?
Its most recent filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and does not take unsolicited requests. Check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
Which funders back the same organizations as Shepherd Charitable Trust?
Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc, The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc, Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program.
Where is Shepherd Charitable Trust based?
Shepherd Charitable Trust is based in MN.

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 31 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-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

Play a game based on Shepherd’s filings →

More from the funding graph