· Private foundation
The Cheng Family 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.
What it funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.
Where the money goes
Grants by size, and the largest recipients.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k1 grant · $3k
- $10k–50k3 grants · $58k
- $50k–250k2 grants · $265k
- $250k+2 grants · $745k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| Dematha Catholic High School | $495,087 |
| Gay and Sober | $250,000 |
| Maryland Food Bank | $215,200 |
| OMF International | $50,000 |
| Propublica | $27,791 |
| We Are One Alliance CO MizMaryland INC | $20,000 |
| DC Youth Orchestra Program | $10,068 |
| Society For Science | $3,000 |
Does the money reach high-need areas?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.
Its human-services grants (FY20–25, $65k) land where the poverty rate runs at 15%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 100% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
How this is measured
Which US states its grants reach
How this is measured
Who it funds again
Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.
Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +75% since the first grant, against +5% for those funded once.
10 repeat relationships: 6 still active in FY2025, 4 since wound down; 2 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (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 FY2025, 98% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $23k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
How this is measured
Backed again, and grew
- TMTHE MARYLAND FOOD BANK INC6× · 2020–2025 · $1.1M · revenue +18%
DC YOUTH ORCHESTRA PROGRAM6× · 2019–2025 · $491k · revenue +75%- GSGAY & SOBER INC2× · 2024–2025 · $270k · revenue +79%
Funded once
- FPFOCUSING PHILANTHROPY INCone grant, 2019 · $107k · revenue +15%
- IGIndividual grant recipientone grant, 2019 · $90k
- MOMEALS ON WHEELS MDone grant, 2020 · $65k
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.
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.
The mission of mit is to advance knowledge and educate students in science, technology, and other areas of scholarship that will best serve the nation and the world in the 21st century.
The foreign policy research institute (frpi) is dedicated to producing the highest quality scholarship and nonpartisan policy analysis focused on crucial foreign policy and national security challenges facing the united states. we educate…
The peterson institute for international economics (piie) is an independent nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization dedicated to strengthening prosperity and human welfare in the global economy through expert analysis and practical…
The open markets institute works to help people relearn how to use competition policy to build stronger democracies, more just and equitable societies, more innovative and sustainable economies, and a more secure and peaceful world.
Organization mission the observer research foundation america orf america is an independent, non-partisan, and nonprofit organization in washington dc dedicated to addressing policy challenges facing the united states, india, and their…
Our mission is to invest in and accelerate the development of the most promising future leaders in biomedical research with global impact.
Advance science, engineering, and innovation throughout the world for the benefit of all. the world's largest multidisciplinary scientific society and a leading publisher of cutting-edge research through its science family of journals,…
The primary mission of furman as a liberal arts institution is to provide a distinctive education in fine arts, humanities, social sciences, mathematics and the sciences, as well as selected professional disciplines.
Provide post-secondary education of excellence.
Undergraduate, graduate, and professional education and research across a broad array of academic domains.
Organization's mission: boston university is an international, comprehensive, private research university, committed to educating students to be reflective, resourceful individuals ready to live, adapt, and lead in an interconnected world.…
The primary exempt purpose of the mitre corporation is to conduct scientific research activities in the public interest that ensure the safety and security of the united states, enabling solutions and decisions related to complex…
How this is measured
16 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. 16 of the 26 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.
Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee
Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing
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.
- Who funds THE MARYLAND FOOD BANK INC ↗
- Who funds DC YOUTH ORCHESTRA PROGRAM ↗
- Who funds GAY & SOBER INC ↗
- Who funds FOCUSING PHILANTHROPY INC ↗
- Who funds The End Fund Inc ↗
- Who funds PRO PUBLICA INC ↗
- Who funds Lifeforce in Later Years Inc ↗
- Who funds HIAS INC ↗
- Who funds MIZMARYLAND INC ↗
- Who funds The Trustees of Princeton University ↗
- Who funds HAWAII COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds REAL ATLANTA CF INC ↗
- Who funds Tinogona Foundation ↗
- Who funds SOCIETY FOR SCIENCE & THE PUBLIC ↗
- Who funds UYGHUR HUMAN RIGHTS PROJECT ↗
- Who funds BARNARD COLLEGE ↗
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.
Open a dossier: American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Amazonsmile Foundation
How this is measured
How much its grantees rely on government
Each dot is one organization The Cheng Family Charitable Trust funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from The Cheng Family Charitable Trust. Bigger dots raise more.
- Hias Inc: 88% of income from government
- The Trustees of Princeton University: 11% of income from government
- The Maryland Food Bank Inc: 11% of income from government
How this is measured
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to The Cheng Family Charitable Trust?
Find your warmest path to The Cheng Family 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.
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