· Private foundation
The Burnham 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 FY2017–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k18 grants · $55k
- $10k–50k2 grants · $38k
- $50k–250k5 grants · $375k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| NATIONAL CONFLICT RESOLUTION CENTER | $150,000 |
| NATIONAL CONFLICT RESOLUTION CENTER | $75,000 |
| INSTITUTE OF THE AMERICAS | $50,000 |
| CAMPANILE FOUNDATION | $50,000 |
| TEACH FOR AMERICA | $50,000 |
| UNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO | $27,743 |
| TIMKEN MUSEUM OF ART | $10,000 |
| MEALS ON WHEELS | $5,000 |
| RYAN FAMILY YMCA | $5,000 |
| ST THERESE OF CARMEL | $5,000 |
| THE SAN DIEGO LGBTQ COMMUNITY CENTER | $5,000 |
| CAMPANILE FOUNDATION | $4,750 |
| IIAN-LAEL FOUNDATION | $4,500 |
| LAS PATRONAS | $3,000 |
| TRANS FAMILY SUPPORT SERVICES | $3,000 |
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 (FY17–24, $72k) land where the poverty rate runs at 11%, 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.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +60% since the first grant, against +46% for the ones you funded once.
60 repeat relationships — 18 still active in FY2024, 42 since wound down; 3 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, 98% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $10k 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
- NCNATIONAL CONFLICT RESOLUTION CENTER8× · 2017–2024 · $752k · revenue +151%
- TSTHE SAN DIEGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA ASSOCIATION4× · 2020–2023 · $625k · revenue +6%
- UOUNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO7× · 2017–2024 · $496k · revenue +60%
Funded once
- CFCSUM FOUNDATIONone grant, 2018 · $225k
- CFCONNECT FOUNDATIONgraduatedone grant, 2018 · $100k · revenue +63%
- BSBOY SCOUTS OF SAN DIEGO AND IMPERIAL COUNTIESone grant, 2021 · $50k
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.
The san diego foundation inspires enduring philanthropy and enables community solutions to improve the quality of life in our region.
The central mission of the university of southern california is the development of human beings and society as a whole through the cultivation and enrichment of the human mind and spirit. the principal means by which our mission is…
San Diego Jewish Academy empowers each student to learn for life, guided by Jewish values and rooted in strength of community.
The policy & innovation center's (pic) mission is to unlock the region's potential by cultivating and building partnerships. our niche is to address intractable issues that can only be solved with cross-sector, multi-jurisdictional…
The mission of san diego botanic garden: we garden to create, share, and apply plant wisdom in our world. the organization's diverse topography and wide variety of microclimates provides visitors with the varied sensations of strolling…
To support the social, recreational, cultural and education programs and facilities, both on campus and in the community, and to advocate for student interests, provide leadership opportunities and participate in shared governance.
To support and cultivate sustainable employment opportunities for San Diego County residents contributing to a prosperous local economy.
Mission: the mission of san diego opera is to deliver exceptional performances and exciting, accessible programs to diverse audiences, focusing on community partnerships, and the transformative and expressive power of the human voice. as…
To support and further the research, education and community service objectives of san diego state university.
The museum of contemporary art san diego invites all audiences to experience our world, our region, and ourselves through the prism of contemporary art.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Uc San Diego Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Futuro Brillante. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
For each theme you fund, this compares how the sector’s money is shifting with how your own giving is shifting.
Sector change and giving change are each shown relative to their own range, growing (right) or shrinking (left); both normalized, so inflation isn’t mistaken for growth.
Your grantees are a median of 28 years old; the field is 12. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 25% startups (under 5 years old) — 0% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 14% 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.
61 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. 61 of the 105 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 NATIONAL CONFLICT RESOLUTION CENTER ↗
- Who funds THE SAN DIEGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds UNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO ↗
- Who funds THE CAMPANILE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds ACCESS YOUTH ACADEMY ↗
- Who funds Teach for America Inc ↗
- Who funds INSTITUTE OF THE AMERICAS ↗
- Who funds KYOTO SYMPOSIUM ORGANIZATION ↗
- Who funds CONNECT FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds MONARCH SCHOOL PROJECT ↗
- Who funds San Diego-Imperial Council Boy Scouts of America ↗
- Who funds SAN DIEGO RESCUE MISSION INC ↗
- Who funds UC SAN DIEGO FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds SAN DIEGO HISTORICAL SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds PLANO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds FUTURO BRILLANTE ↗
- Who funds THE PUTNAM FOUNDATION DBA TIMKEN MUSEUM OF ART ↗
- Who funds VAPA Foundation ↗
- Who funds THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF THE LELAND STANFORD JUNIOR UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds YMCA OF SAN DIEGO COUNTY ↗
- Who funds JULIAN COMMUNITY HERITAGE FNDN (JCHF) ↗
- Who funds SAN DIEGO HUMANE SOCIETY AND SPCA ↗
- Who funds THE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS ↗
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: Jewish Community Foundation of San Diego · The Conrad Prebys Foundation · The San Diego Foundation · Price Philanthropies Foundation · Sempra Foundation · David C Copley Foundation · Rancho Santa Fe Foundation · Walter J & Betty C Zable Foundation · The Parker Foundation · The Cushman Foundation · Art Pratt Foundation of Old Mission Rc · Girard 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 The Burnham 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 Burnham Foundation?
Find your warmest path to The Burnham 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.