· Private foundation
The Sara Smith Self Foundation Inc
Its FY2024 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
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 $10k20 grants · $68k
- $10k–50k7 grants · $130k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| WAKE FOREST BAPTIST MEDICAL CENTER | $25,000 |
| UNIVERSITY OF NC AT GREENSBORO SCHOOL OF EDUCATION | $25,000 |
| THE SUMMIT SCHOOL | $25,000 |
| NOBLE ACADEMY | $20,000 |
| SECU FAMILY HOUSE | $15,000 |
| BREAKTHROUGH T1D | $10,000 |
| NORTH CAROLINA MUSEUM OF HISTORY | $10,000 |
| SECOND HARVEST FOOD BANK OF NORTHWEST NC | $6,500 |
| CHRIST SCHOOL | $6,000 |
| THE RANDOLPH COUNTY ARTS GUILD | $5,000 |
| SALVATION ARMY CENTER OF HOPE | $5,000 |
| THIRD STREET EDUCATION CENTER | $5,000 |
| STOKES COUNTY ARTS COUNCIL FOR ART IN EDUCATION | $4,000 |
| BOOKMARKS INC | $3,000 |
| THE ARTS COUNCIL OF WINSTON-SALEMFORSYTH COUNTY | $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 (FY21–24, $50k) land where the poverty rate runs at 15%, against an area that typically sits at 12%. 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 +32% since the first grant, against +13% for the ones you funded once.
30 repeat relationships — 23 still active in FY2024, 7 since wound down; 4 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, 89% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $21k 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
- TSThe Summit School Incorporated5× · 2020–2024 · $190k · revenue +32%
- NANOBLE ACADEMY3× · 2022–2024 · $55k · revenue +0%
SENIOR SERVICES INC4× · 2021–2024 · $38k · revenue +43%
Funded once
- SASALEM ACADEMY AND COLLEGEone grant, 2021 · $8k · revenue +13%
- OSOLD SALEM INCgraduatedone grant, 2021 · $3k · revenue +59%
- HCHenderson County & Thermal Belt Habitat for Humanity2× · 2022–2023 · $3k · revenue -2%
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 Children's Home Society of North Carolina's mission is to promote the right of every child to a permanent, safe, and loving family.
To cultivate curious, collaborative, and creative thinkers in a christ-centered community.
To provide an enriching and challenging curriculum and educational community which encourages students to be life-long learners, develop strong character, serve their community, and deepen their faith.
Provide food, shelter, rehabilitation and christian ministry to the poor and homeless
We foster meaningful connections and link resources to purposeful action, creating a brighter future for all who call Forsyth County home.
To operate a private school for pre-kindergarten through grade 12 in Wilmington, NC
Northeastern seminary strives to be a vibrant source for christian theological formation whose students are formed in a biblical vision of gracious christianity and impact wholeness to the world in an expansive array of vocations and…
NourishNC, Inc.'s goal is to provide healthy food to hungry children, empowering them to succeed in the classroom and in their community
Charlotte christian school is a christ-centered, college preparatory school, equipping and developing students to effectively integrate biblical truth and learning nto their daily lives and to impact the culture for christ.
Through excellence in education, charlotte country day school develops the potential of each student by fostering intellectual curiosity, principled character, ethical leadership and a responsibility to serve. the key values and…
Carolina prep is a school for preschool through primary formed to build a diverse, positive, stimulating learning environment which values excellence in academics, leadership, and service.
Operation of a north carolina public charter school
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Salem Academy and College and the most unlike its peers is Second Harvest Food Bank of Northwest Nc Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
20 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. 20 of the 40 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 Summit School Incorporated ↗
- Who funds NOBLE ACADEMY ↗
- Who funds SENIOR SERVICES INC ↗
- Who funds NORTH CAROLINA MUSEUM OF HISTORY FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds Third Street Education Center Inc ↗
- Who funds SECOND HARVEST FOOD BANK OF NORTHWEST NC INC ↗
- Who funds SAMARITAN MINISTRIES ↗
- Who funds BOOKMARKS INC ↗
- Who funds CROSSNORE COMMUNITIES FOR CHILDREN ↗
- Who funds CRISIS CONTROL MINISTRY INC ↗
- Who funds CRITICAL ROLE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds SALEM ACADEMY AND COLLEGE ↗
- Who funds EXCHANGE CLUB CENTER FOR THE PREVENTION OF CHILD ABUSE OF NORTH CAROLINA INC ↗
- Who funds CHRIST SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds THE WINSTON-SALEM RESCUE MISSION INC ↗
- Who funds ANIMAL ADOPTION & RESCUE FOUNDATION OF WINSTON-SALEM INC ↗
- Who funds THE LITTLE THEATRE OF WINSTON-SALEM INC ↗
- Who funds OLD SALEM INC ↗
- Who funds ORANGE COUNTY JUSTICE UNITED ↗
- Who funds Henderson County & Thermal Belt Habitat for Humanity ↗
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: Reynolds American Foundation · The Winston-Salem Foundation · Strickland Family Foundation Cynthia a S Graham · J & J Neely Foundation · Richard Wood Averill Charitable Trust aka Richard Wood Averill Foundation · Shallow Ford Foundation Inc · Ta John W and Anna H Hanes Foundation · The Cannon Foundation Inc · Triangle Community Foundation Inc · Foundation for the Carolinas · Duke Energy Foundation · Pfefferkorn Foundation Inc
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 Sara Smith Self Foundation Inc 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 Sara Smith Self Foundation Inc?
Find your warmest path to The Sara Smith Self Foundation Inc 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.