· Private foundation
The Berstein Family Foundation
Its FY2024 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 FY2020–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k4 grants · $19k
- $10k–50k7 grants · $105k
- $50k–250k15 grants · $1.3M
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| Individual grant recipient | $208,000 |
| BETHANNA CO KAREN HAMILTON | $100,000 |
| TEMPLE SHOLOM | $100,000 |
| GRADUATE PHILADELPHIA | $90,000 |
| TEACH PLUS | $85,000 |
| JULES E MASTBAUM HIGH SCHOOL | $85,000 |
| COLLEGE POSSIBLE | $85,000 |
| GIRARD ACADEMIC MUSIC PROGRAM | $75,000 |
| ALUMNAE ASSOCIATION OF THE PHILADELPHIA HIGH SCHOOL FOR GIRLS | $75,000 |
| LANKENAU MEDICAL CENTER | $75,000 |
| GEORGE WASHINGTON HIGH SCHOOL | $75,000 |
| BIG PICTURE PHILADELPHIA | $75,000 |
| THE FRIENDS OF CARVER CO DARRYL JOHNSON | $70,000 |
| WB HIGH SCHOOL | $70,000 |
| WRITERS MATTER | $50,000 |
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 (FY20–24, $755k) land where the poverty rate runs at 19%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 82% 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.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +40% since the first grant, against +26% for the ones you funded once.
33 repeat relationships — 18 still active in FY2024, 15 since wound down; 8 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, 67% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $469k 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
- BPBIG PICTURE PHILADELPHIA4× · 2021–2024 · $361k · revenue +8%
TEACH PLUS INC5× · 2020–2024 · $335k · revenue +68%- GPGRADUATE PHILADELPHIA4× · 2021–2024 · $290k · revenue +3%
Funded once
- TOTRUSTEES OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PA SWEETS FOUNDATION PENN MEDone grant, 2020 · $250k
- IGIndividual grant recipientone grant, 2023 · $198k
- BBETHANNAgraduatedone grant, 2020 · $133k · revenue +124%
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.
We develop, engage, and retain principals and system leaders who transform schools, dramatically improve student outcomes, and drive systemic change to prepare all philadelphia students for college, career, and life.
The mission of the philadelphia education fund (pef) is to create equitable access to opportunities for students by providing resources and expertise that build paths to college and career success. pef focuses on philadelphia public school…
Drexel university fulfills its founder's vision of preparing each new generation of students for productive professional and civic lives while also focusing its collective expertise on solving society's greatest problems. drexel is an…
The philadelphia school educates children for a future that is impossible to know but not impossible to shape. learn here. go anywhere.
Heights is a new kind of organization, an economic mobility catalyst. we believe that creating pathways to educational and workforce success for low-income, black and brown, and first-generation-to-college students is the keystone of a…
Philadelphia youth network (pyn) equips young people to build lifelong skills, pursue meaningful careers, and embrace change with confidence - so they can thrive in the workforce, experience economic mobility, and strengthen their…
The institute for advanced study (the institute) is one of the world's leading centers for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. see schedule o.
Philadelphia college opportunity resources for education ("core") is a nonprofit corporation founded in philadelphia, pa in 2003. core was organized to provide financial scholarships and college prep assistance to high school students.…
Philadelphia jewish film and medias mission is to educate and engage diverse philadelphia communities, jewish and non-jewish alike, by presenting world-class film premieres, repertory cinema, and associated programs that are inspired by…
The pittsburgh promise promotes high educational aspirations among urban youth, funds scholarships for post-secondary access, and fuels a prepared and diverse regional workforce.
As philadelphia's jesuit catholic university, saint joseph's provides a rigorous, student-centered education rooted in the liberal arts. we prepare students for personal excellence, professional success, and engaged citizenship. striving…
Foundations is dedicated to improving the quality of education for our nation's most vulnerable children by strengthening the skills of educators through professional learning. foundations, inc. is a not-for-profit educational service…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Graduate Philadelphia and the most unlike its peers is American Heart Association Inc. 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 30 years old; the field is 17. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 20% startups (under 5 years old) — 6% of your grantees by number, and just 5% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 3% 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.
33 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. 33 of the 71 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 TRUSTEES OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA ↗
- Who funds BIG PICTURE PHILADELPHIA ↗
- Who funds TEACH PLUS INC ↗
- Who funds GRADUATE PHILADELPHIA ↗
- Who funds SPRINGBOARD COLLABORATIVE ↗
- Who funds AFTER SCHOOL ACTIVITIES PARTNERSHIPS ↗
- Who funds JEWISH FAMILY & CHILDREN'S SERVICE OF GREATER PHILADELPHIA ↗
- Who funds CODED BY ↗
- Who funds PHILADELPHIA ACADEMIES INC ↗
- Who funds WRITERS MATTER ↗
- Who funds CENTER FOR BLACK EDUCATOR DEVELOPMENT ↗
- Who funds BETHANNA ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF UNISTREAM INC ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF OFANIM INC ↗
- Who funds UPLIFT CENTER FOR GRIEVING CHILDREN ↗
- Who funds ALUMNAE ASSOCIATION PHILA HIGH SCHOOL FOR GIRLS ↗
- Who funds Main Line Hospitals 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: The Philadelphia Foundation · The William Penn Foundation · United Way of Greater Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey · The Neubauer Family Foundation · The Patricia Kind Family Foundation · Lindback Cr & Mf Foundation Tw Main · The Lenfest Foundation Inc · The Allen Hilles Fund · The Daniel B and Florence E Green Foundation · Henrietta Tower Wurts Memorial Foundation · The Barra Foundation Inc · Henry Dolfinger 2 Trust Uw
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 The Berstein Family 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 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.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to The Berstein Family Foundation?
Find your warmest path to The Berstein Family 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.