· Private foundation
The Episode 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 $10k3 grants · $10k
- $10k–50k5 grants · $55k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $62k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART BOSTON | $62,000 |
| BOSTON ART REVIEW | $15,000 |
| MASSART ART MUSEUM | $10,000 |
| BOSTON PUBLIC ART TRIENNIAL | $10,000 |
| BRIMMER AND MAY SCHOOL | $10,000 |
| GRUBSTREET | $10,000 |
| GEORGTOWN UNIVERSITY | $5,000 |
| TRUSTEES OF TUFTS UNIVERSITY | $3,000 |
| THE ASSOCIATES OF THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY | $2,000 |
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 (FY19–22, $14k) land where the poverty rate runs at 16%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 93% 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 +76% since the first grant, against +47% for the ones you funded once.
40 repeat relationships — 4 still active in FY2024, 36 since wound down; 5 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, 69% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $40k 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
THE INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART INC8× · 2017–2024 · $219k · revenue +31%- AFARTISTS FOR HUMANITY INC7× · 2017–2023 · $106k · revenue +83%
BOSTON BALLET INC3× · 2021–2023 · $25k · revenue +94%
Funded once
826 BOSTON INCgraduatedone grant, 2021 · $10k · revenue +143%- ABARTS & BUSINESS COUNCIL OF GREATER BOSTON INCgraduatedone grant, 2021 · $10k · revenue +287%
- HFHORIZONS FOR HOMELESS CHILDRENgraduatedone grant, 2021 · $10k · revenue +47%
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 bac is committed to provide excellence in design education grounded in practice and accessible to diverse communities.
Organization's mission statement true to the ambitious vision of its founder and her spirit of creative risk-taking, the mission of the isabella stewart gardner museum is: - to bring to life and preserve the rich historic collection; - to…
The Boston Public Library provides educational and cultural enrichment free to all by engaging the public through programming and active spaces, restoring and preserving our history, providing access to borrow from our vast collection of…
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 mission of the brooklyn institute of arts and sciences, d/b/a brooklyn museum (the "museum") is to bring people together through art and experiences that inspire celebration, compassion, courage, and the will to act. (see schedule o).
Organization's mission bentley university believes good business can impact more than the bottom line - it can change the world. bentley is a community of future business leaders who will deliver value in the marketplace and lasting…
The Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) is a world-renowned center for biological discovery and training that is notably affiliated with more than 60 Nobel Prize winners. Research is conducted by full-time faculty as well as hundreds of the…
Mass general brigham incorporated is developing an integrated health care delivery system throughout the region that offers patients a continuum of coordinated, high-quality care.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Boston Harbor Now Inc and the most unlike its peers is Lynn Museum and Historical Society Inc. 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 37 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) — 0% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 3% lost their exemption, against 10% 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.
39 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. 39 of the 57 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 INSTITUTE OF CONTEMPORARY ART INC ↗
- Who funds ARTISTS FOR HUMANITY INC ↗
- Who funds FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ↗
- Who funds NAHANT HISTORICAL SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds GRUB STREET INC ↗
- Who funds BOSTON BALLET INC ↗
- Who funds GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds ESPLANADE ASSOCIATION INC ↗
- Who funds MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS ↗
- Who funds BOSTON ART REVIEW INC ↗
- Who funds BRIMMER AND MAY SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds 826 BOSTON INC ↗
- Who funds BOSTON PUBLIC ART TRIENNIAL INC ↗
- Who funds ARTS & BUSINESS COUNCIL OF GREATER BOSTON INC ↗
- Who funds HORIZONS FOR HOMELESS CHILDREN ↗
- Who funds CHARLES RIVER WATERSHED ASSOCIATION INC ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN REPERTORY THEATRE CO INC ↗
- Who funds PARTNERS IN HEALTH A NONPROFIT CORPORATION ↗
- Who funds MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES USA INC ↗
- Who funds Mercy Ships International ↗
- Who funds PERKINS SCHOOL FOR THE BLIND ↗
- Who funds The Farm School Inc ↗
- Who funds CONSERVATION LAW FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds MY BROTHER'S TABLE INC ↗
- Who funds OCEAN CONSERVANCY ↗
- Who funds ARTS AFTER HOURS INC ↗
- Who funds Nahant Preservation Trust Inc ↗
- Who funds LIVABLE STREETS TRANSPORTATION ALLIANCE OF BOSTON INC ↗
- Who funds Boston Charitable Trust Fund City of Boston Trust Office ↗
- Who funds SAVE THE HARBORSAVE THE BAY INC ↗
- Who funds BOSTON HARBOR NOW 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: Boston Foundation Inc · Eastern Bank Foundation · Barr Foundation · Eastern Cambridge Foundation · Highland Street Connection and Subsidiaries · Liberty Mutual Foundation Inc · Fidelity Foundation · Lawrence & Lillian Solomon Foundation Inc · Oristaglio Family Foundation · Lovett-Woodsum Foundation Inc · The Beker Foundation · Ge Aerospace 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 Episode 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, a single department, or state — and drag the year to watch it move.
- Boston Harbor Now Inc — 45% of income from government
- The Home for Little Wanderers Inc — 38% of income from government
- Italian Home for Children Inc — 29% of income from government
- Horizons for Homeless Children — 21% of income from government
- Trustees of Boston University — 12% of income from government
- The Farm School Inc — 12% of income from government
- Arts & Business Council of Greater Boston Inc — 8% of income from government
- Charles River Watershed Association Inc — 8% of income from government
- Perkins School for the Blind — 7% of income from government
- Peabody Essex Museum Inc — 3% of income from government
- 826 Boston Inc — 3% of income from government
- Cradles to Crayons Inc — 2% of income from government
- Boston Art Review Inc — 2% of income from government
- Artists for Humanity Inc — 2% of income from government
- Grub Street Inc — 2% of income from government
- The Institute of Contemporary Art Inc — 1% of income from government
- Boston Ballet Inc — 0% of income from government
- American Repertory Theatre Co Inc — 0% of income from government
- Museum of Fine Arts — 0% of income from government
- Rosie's Place Inc — 0% of income from government
- Partners in Health a Nonprofit Corporation — 0% of income from government
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 Episode Foundation?
Find your warmest path to The Episode 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.