· Private foundation
The Margaret Ellen Nielsen Foundation
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 you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k2 grants · $8k
- $10k–50k6 grants · $105k
- $50k–250k5 grants · $440k
- $250k+1 grant · $250k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND | $250,000 |
| WILLIAMS COLLEGE | $150,000 |
| URBAN YOUTH IMPACT INC | $125,000 |
| INTERVARSITY CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP- USA | $65,000 |
| LEVER INC | $50,000 |
| URBAN YOUTH IMPACT INC | $50,000 |
| SOUTHWICK CIVIC FUND INC | $25,000 |
| SIM USA INCORPORATED | $25,000 |
| YOUTH VOLUNTEER CORPS | $20,000 |
| INTERVARSITY CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP- USA | $15,000 |
| HUCKLEBERRY SPRINGS CHURCH | $10,000 |
| HEIFER PROJECT INTERNATIONAL | $10,000 |
| INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF EVANGELICAL STUDENTS U | $5,000 |
| INTERVARSITY CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP- USA | $2,500 |
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 (FY22–25, $108k) 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 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.
Which US states your grants reach
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.
Where the work is directed
The same grants, placed two ways — where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose earmarks the money.
About 26% of The Margaret Ellen Nielsen Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked, by their stated purpose, for a different county than the recipient’s own address — money that lands at a nonprofit in one place but is meant to do its work in another.
Recipient view: each grant at its grantee’s ZIP, mapped to a county. Directed view: each grant at the county its stated purpose names, falling back to the recipient’s county when the purpose names no place; US grants only. A county shows only if it carries the top 95% of that view’s dollars. Purposes are read from the foundation’s own 990 grant descriptions.
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 +24% since the first grant, against +21% for the ones you funded once.
12 repeat relationships — 6 still active in FY2025, 6 since wound down; 4 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, 65% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $195k 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
- UYUrban Youth Impact Inc3× · 2019–2025 · $275k · revenue +24%
- LILEVER INC5× · 2021–2025 · $240k · revenue +26%
- YVYouth Volunteer Corps4× · 2022–2025 · $83k · revenue +37%
Funded once
- SASCHOLARSHIP AMERICA INCone grant, 2020 · $86k
- SCSOUTHWICK CONGREGATIONAL CHURCHone grant, 2023 · $60k
MISERICORDIA FOUNDATIONgraduatedone grant, 2023 · $25k · revenue +52%
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.
Christianity Today is a global community inspired by evangelical conviction to advance the stories and ideas of the kingdom of God. Our mission is to elevate the storytellers and sages of the global church.
As part of the body of Christ, to see that every young person in every people group in every nation has the opportunity to make an informed decision to be a follower of Jesus Christ and become a part of the local church.
To proclaim the gospel, grow the messianic jewish community and engage the church concerning israel and the jewish people. this is done through education, evangelism and being a movement leader, all with excellence in order to transform…
As a christian university, we provide education and research opportunities preparing global leaders to partner with local communities.
TO MANAGE AN INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, HEALTH, AND RELIEF FOCUSED FAMILY OF ORGANIZATIONS HELPING PEOPLE AND COMMUNITIES LIFT THEMSELVES OUT OF POVERTY, SUPPORT WELL-BEING OF INDIVIDUALS, FAMILIES AND COMMUNITIES, AND PROVIDE…
Chi prepares graduates of the christel house schools operated by its affiliated entities, which chi funds and oversees, to achieve upward economic mobility, demonstrate good citizenship, and become empowered to identify and realize their…
The international leadership institute (ili) changes history by accelerating the spread of the gospel through training and mobilizing leaders of leaders to reach their nations. ili accomplishes this purpose through cutting edge leadership…
Mercy Health will provide assistance, support and direction to all of the health care institutions and activities operated and maintained by its Subsidiaries. The mission of Mercy Health in performing these activities shall be to provide a…
Central indiana corporate partnership (cicp) is an alliance of indiana's business and research university leaders coming together to foster long-term prosperity for the region. cicp's mission is to transform the economy of indiana in order…
Devworks international is dedicated to a society where all people enjoy the freedom to pursue their own sustainable development. we contribute to this by strengthening the capacity of local organizations.
See schedule o for a more detailed description of ide's mission statement and achievements.
Evangel is a comprehensive christian university that is committed to excellence in educating and equipping students to become spirit empowered servants of god who will impact the church and society globally.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Heifer International Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Partners in Health a Nonprofit Corporation. 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 16. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 22% 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 13% 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.
22 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. 22 of the 29 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 InterVarsity Christian FellowshipUSA ↗
- Who funds Urban Youth Impact Inc ↗
- Who funds FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ↗
- Who funds LEVER INC ↗
- Who funds Williams College ↗
- Who funds Youth Volunteer Corps ↗
- Who funds INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF EVANGELICAL STUDENTS USA INC ↗
- Who funds WORLDWIDE DISCIPLESHIP ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds WORLD VISION INC ↗
- Who funds RUTGERS UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds MISERICORDIA FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds PARTNERS IN HEALTH A NONPROFIT CORPORATION ↗
- Who funds WOMEN IN THE WINDOW INTERNATIONAL INC ↗
- Who funds JEWISH FEDERATION OF PALM BEACH COUNTY INC ↗
- Who funds HEIFER PROJECT INTERNATIONAL ↗
- Who funds HEIFER INTERNATIONAL FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES USA INC ↗
- Who funds The Children's Hospital of Alabama ↗
- Who funds JUPITER CHRISTIAN SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds Housing Partnership Inc ↗
- Who funds CHRISTIANS FOR BIBLICAL EQUALITY ↗
- Who funds Christians Reaching Out To Society 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: Natl Christian Charitable Fdn Inc · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · National Philanthropic Trust · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Amazonsmile 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 Margaret Ellen Nielsen 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.
- Lever Inc — 10% of income from government
- Partners in Health a Nonprofit Corporation — 0% of income from government
- Rutgers University Foundation — 0% of income from government
- Williams College — 0% of income from government
- Housing Partnership Inc — 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.