Skip to content
Plinth
Foundation Dossiers
Plinth

· Private foundation

The Sarofim Foundation

Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.

$105M
Granted FY2025still arriving
90
Grants FY2025still arriving
6
States reached
$8.0M
Largest
01What you fundRead
02The needRead
03Your edgeRead
04Your fieldRead
05Through PlinthRead
01What you fund
0165% classified

What you funded, over time

Every grant clustered by its grantee’s IRS cause code (NTEE), by year — across FY2024–2025.

Education$31MArts & Culture$14MHealth$8.3MYouth Development$6.1MHuman Services$5.8MEnvironment$5.1MPhilanthropy$1.9MHousing & Shelter$600kRecreation & Sports$524kOther$41M
02FY2025 · 90 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

By grant size · FY2025

  • $10k–50k1 grant · $25k
  • $50k–250k38 grants · $5.2M
  • $250k+51 grants · $100M
$250,000
Median grant
6
States reached
$3.2B
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
University of St Thomas$8,000,000
Harris Health Strategic Fund$6,000,000
Kinkaid School Inc$6,000,000
St John's School$6,000,000
Alley Theatre$5,150,000
Foundation for Jones Hall$5,017,647
Camp For All Foundation$5,000,000
Houston Charter Seed Fund$5,000,000
Buffalo Bayou Partnership$5,000,000
McCombs School of Business$5,000,000
JESUIT CRISTO REY HIGH SCHOOL OF HOUSTON$5,000,000
The Hobby Center Foundation$5,000,000
Baylor College of Medicine$4,100,000
Princeton University$4,000,000
Goldman Sachs Donor Advised Fund$3,020,000
02The need
03

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.

show:

Your human-services grants (FY24–25, $5.8M) land where the poverty rate runs at 16%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 100% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 11%YMCA OF GREATER HOUSTON: $2.0M → 16%YMCA OF GREATER HOUSTON: $75k → 16%Boys & Girls Country of Houston: $100k → 16%Target Hunger: $1.0M → 16%Memorial Assistance Ministries: $1.0M → 16%DePelchin Children's Center: $1.5M → 16%DePelchin Children's Center: $25k → 16%Kids' Meals Inc: $150k → 16%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

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.

03Your edge
repeat funding

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.

38%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.
$43M · 43 repeat orgs$71M to everyone else

43 repeat relationships — 43 still active in FY2025, 0 since wound down; 46 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

43
19

Total granted

$43M
$953k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+8%
+16%

Still filing today

81%
58%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 33% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $70M went to new ones.

50%100%’24’25
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’24’25
EducationArts & CultureHealthHuman ServicesYouth DevelopmentRecreation & SportsOther

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

  • UO
    University of St Thomas
    2× · 2024–2025 · $8.0M · revenue +14%
  • BC
    Baylor College of Medicine
    2× · 2024–2025 · $6.1M · revenue +8%
  • The Trustees of Princeton University
    2× · 2024–2025 · $6.0M · revenue +4%

Funded once

  • CR
    Cristo Rey Jesuit
    one grant, 2024 · $200k
  • BA
    BLOOM ACADEMY INC
    one grant, 2024 · $150k · revenue -22%
  • HC
    Harbor Christian Academygraduated
    one grant, 2024 · $100k · revenue +87%

Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Your field

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.

1
Houston Botanic Garden

To enrich life through discovery, education, and the conservation of plants and the natural environment.

Environment
2
Houston Museum of Natural Science

The mission of the Houston Museum of Natural Science shall be to preserve and advance the general knowledge of natural science; to enhance in individuals the knowledge of and delight in natural science and related subjects; and to maintain…

Arts & Culture
3
Trees for Houston

Plant, protect and promote trees all over the greater Houston area.

—
4
Breakthrough Houston

The mission of Breakthrough Houston (BTH) is to work with highly motivated students to achieve post-secondary success and empower aspiring leaders to become the next generation of educational advocates.

Education
5
Houston Independent School District Foundation

The HISD Foundation is dedicated to mobilizing the local community to support innovative priorities in HISD to improve outcomes for all students in the district. Our mission is to fund projects and programs of merit that fall outside of…

—
6
Presbyterian School

Family, School, and Church united in the education and support of each child - this is the founding premise upon which Presbyterian School nurtures and challenges its students. The school provides an educational program of the highest…

Education
7
The Fay School

See Schedule O. The Fay School ("the School") is a nonsectarian, not-for-profit, co-educational school in which children of diverse talents and backgrounds with strong academic abilities are offered a high-quality education in a secure,…

—
8
John P McGovern Museum of Health & Medical Science

The Health Museum is an innovative science center that provides an interactive and entertaining experience for all ages, promotes understanding and appreciation of the human body, mind, and spirit, and inspires a lifelong commitment to…

Arts & Culture
9
Made Houston

MADE Houston was formed to create a school community focused on nurturing and developing the unique academic and social needs of students with learning differences and to successfully transition students into mainstream schools.

Education
10
Houston Local Information Initiative Inc

The Houston Local Information Initiative, Inc. provides public service journalism that reflects the civic needs of the diverse communities comprising Greater Houston.

Arts & Culture
11
The Heritage Society

The Heritage Society (THS) is a nonprofit organization founded in 1954 whose mission is to tell the stories of the diverse history of Houston and Texas through collections, exhibits, the arts, educational programs, film, video, and other…

—
12
Harris County Medical Society

Our mission is to be the leading advocate for our member physicians, their patients and our community, in promoting the highest standards of ethical medical practice, access to quality medical care, medical education, research, and…

—

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is The Methodist Hospital Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Susan Smith Blackburn Prize 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.

← shrinkinggrowing →↓ leaning in → pulling backsteadyAffordable Housing ProvidersHouston Parks & Nature Orga…Pediatric Healthcare SystemsFoster Care & Child Welfare…Developmental Disabilities …Independent K-12 SchoolsIndependent K-12 SchoolsEarly Childhood Care Servic…Christian Missionary and Ev…Performing Arts Organizatio…
the sector your giving your giving is ahead of the sector the sector’s ahead of you· dot size = how much the theme matters to each side
Ordered by the change in your giving — leaning in on top, pulling back at the bottom. The bar between the two dots is how out of step you are with the sector. Hover any row for detail.

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 36 years old; the field is 11. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.

THE FIELDby orgYOUR GRANTEESby number30%2%<5yr17%7%5–10yr21%13%10–20yr17%24%20–35yr8%27%35–55yr8%26%55yr+
THE FIELDby orgYOUR MONEYby value30%6%<5yr17%2%5–10yr21%4%10–20yr17%24%20–35yr8%31%35–55yr8%33%55yr+

The field is 30% startups (under 5 years old) — 2% of your grantees by number, and just 6% of your money.

Closures · last 5 years

The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 19% of the field you don’t fund.

orgs you fund
0.0%0/89
the rest of the field
19%
3,802/20,352

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.

04the grantee network

83 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. 83 of the 109 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.

1
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
14
Early backer (in before they grew)
83/83
Grantees still filing
46/83
Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

St John's School — $6,000,000 · OtherSt John's SchoolTHE FOUNDATION FOR JONES HALL — $5,017,647 · OtherTHE FOUNDATION FOR JONES HALLMcCombs School of Business — $5,000,000 · OtherMcCombs School of BusinessHouston Charter Seed Fund — $5,000,000 · OtherHouston Charter Seed FundCRISTO REY JESUIT HIGH SCHOOL OF HOUSTON INC — $5,000,000 · OtherCRISTO REY JESUIT HIGH SCHOOL OF HOUSTON IN…Goldman Sachs Donor Advised Fund — $3,020,000 · OtherGoldman Sachs Donor Advised FundHOUSTON CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY — $3,000,000 · OtherHOUSTON CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITYEPISCOPAL HIGH SCHOOL — $1,750,000 · Other+44 more — $10,616,500 · Other+44 moreUniversity of St Thomas — $8,025,000 · EducationUniversity of St ThomasBaylor College of Medicine — $6,100,000 · EducationBaylor College of MedicineThe Trustees of Princeton University — $6,000,000 · EducationThe Trustees of Princeton Univ…The Kinkaid School Inc — $6,000,000 · EducationThe Kinkaid School Inc+14 more — $5,215,000 · Education+14 moreALLEY THEATRE — $5,300,000 · Arts & CultureALLEY THEATREThe Hobby Center Foundation — $5,000,000 · Arts & CultureThe Hobby Cen…Contemporary Arts Museum Houston — $1,275,000 · Arts & CultureContemporary …+12 more — $2,265,000 · Arts & Culture+12 moreHARRIS HEALTH STRATEGIC FUND — $6,000,000 · HealthHalo House Foundation — $1,500,000 · Health+9 more — $840,000 · HealthCamp For All Foundation — $5,000,000 · Youth DevelopmentPROUNITAS INC — $400,000 · Youth DevelopmentTHRIVE WITH AUTISM — $300,000 · Youth DevelopmentONEGOAL — $250,000 · Youth Development+1 more — $125,000 · Youth DevelopmentYoung Men's Christian Association of the Greater Houston Area — $2,075,000 · Human ServicesDEPELCHIN CHILDREN'S CENTER — $1,525,000 · Human ServicesTarget Hunger Inc — $1,000,000 · Human ServicesMemorial Assistance Ministries — $1,000,000 · Human Services+2 more — $250,000 · Human ServicesBuffalo Bayou Partnership Inc — $5,000,000 · Environment+1 more — $70,000 · Environment
Other$44,404,147Education$31,340,000Arts & Culture$13,840,000Health$8,340,000Youth Development$6,075,000Human Services$5,850,000Environment$5,070,000

Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ your share of their budgetUniversity of St Thomas — $8,025,000 over 2y, 5.2% of budgetBaylor College of Medicine — $6,100,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetThe Trustees of Princeton University — $6,000,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetHARRIS HEALTH STRATEGIC FUND — $6,000,000 over 1y, 21% of budgetSt John's School — $6,000,000 over 1y, 5.1% of budgetThe Kinkaid School Inc — $6,000,000 over 1y, 6.2% of budgetALLEY THEATRE — $5,300,000 over 2y, 14% of budgetTHE FOUNDATION FOR JONES HALL — $5,017,647 over 1y, 55% of budgetHOUSTON CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY — $3,000,000 over 1y, 1.7% of budgetYoung Men's Christian Association of the Greater Houston Area — $2,075,000 over 2y, 1.7% of budgetDEPELCHIN CHILDREN'S CENTER — $1,525,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetContemporary Arts Museum Houston — $1,275,000 over 2y, 16% of budgetST GEORGE'S SCHOOL — $1,000,000 over 1y, 1.8% of budgetUnited Way of Greater Houston — $750,000 over 2y, 0.6% of budgetYES Prep Public Schools Inc — $550,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetETOILE ACADEMY INC — $550,000 over 2y, 1.9% of budgetKIPP Texas Inc — $550,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetTHE SAINT CONSTANTINE SCHOOL — $500,000 over 1y, 3.3% of budgetThe Houston Food Bank — $500,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetEMERGE Fellowship — $450,000 over 2y, 3.3% of budgetWONDERLAND EDUCATIONAL ESTATE DBA BEATRICE MAYES INSTITUTE — $450,000 over 2y, 2.3% of budgetMenil Foundation Inc — $400,000 over 2y, 0.7% of budgetThe Awty International School — $400,000 over 2y, 0.3% of budgetPROUNITAS INC — $400,000 over 2y, 9.1% of budgetSTAR OF HOPE MISSION — $350,000 over 2y, 2.1% of budgetHouston Grand Opera Association Inc — $350,000 over 2y, 0.7% of budgetTHE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS HOUSTON — $325,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetTHRIVE WITH AUTISM — $300,000 over 2y, 3.6% of budgetSmall Steps Nurturing Center — $300,000 over 2y, 2.7% of budgetHOUSTON CLASSICAL INC — $300,000 over 2y, 1.7% of budgetTHE FORGE FOR FAMILIES — $300,000 over 2y, 4.7% of budgetAgape Development Ministries — $300,000 over 1y, 5.7% of budgetCHILDREN'S MUSEUM INC — $300,000 over 2y, 1.1% of budgetTHE SOCIETY OF ST VINCENT DE PAUL DIOCESAN COUNCIL OF AUSTIN — $285,000 over 2y, 1.8% of budgetONEGOAL — $250,000 over 1y, 0.9% of budgetGood Reason Houston Inc — $250,000 over 1y, 2.6% of budgetDiscovery Green Conservancy — $225,000 over 2y, 1.8% of budgetRiver Oaks Chamber Orchestra — $200,000 over 1y, 9.6% of budgetCHINQUAPIN PREPARATORY SCHOOL — $200,000 over 1y, 6.5% of budgetStages — $200,000 over 2y, 2.0% of budgetTeach for America Inc — $200,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetCHRISTUS Foundation for HealthCare — $175,000 over 2y, 1.7% of budgetBLOOM ACADEMY INC — $150,000 over 1y, 2.3% of budgetDa Camera Society of Texas — $150,000 over 1y, 4.4% of budgetBARBARA BUSH HOUSTON LITERACY FOUNDATION — $130,000 over 2y, 0.6% of budgetEIGHT MILLION STORIES INC — $125,000 over 1y, 14% of budgetGAME CONSERVANCY USA INC — $124,000 over 2y, 6.0% of budgetHarbor Christian Academy — $100,000 over 1y, 8.8% of budget
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.

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.

The Brown Foundation …Greater Houston Commu…Houston Endowment IncAlbert & Ethel Herzst…Vivian L Smith Founda…MD Anderson FoundationThe Elkins FoundationThe Powell FoundationShell USA Company Fou…Strake FoundationThe William Stamps Fa…The Cullen Foundation
The Brown Foundation IncTX76.8× affinity36 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: The Brown Foundation Inc · Greater Houston Community Foundation · Houston Endowment Inc · Albert & Ethel Herzstein Charitable Foundation · Vivian L Smith Foundation · MD Anderson Foundation · The Elkins Foundation · The Powell Foundation · Shell USA Company Foundation · Strake Foundation · The William Stamps Farish Fund · The Cullen 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 Sarofim 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.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 10%4%15%34%60%your share of their income ↑0%19%38%56%75%share of the org’s income from government →median 11%
  • The Trustees of Princeton University — 11% of income from government
no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
1get no government money at all
20report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
0rely on government for over half their income
⤢ axis zoomed · 0–75%
typical government reliance, FY20–25

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.

05Through Plinth

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to The Sarofim Foundation?

Find your warmest path to The Sarofim 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.

On method. Every financial figure here is read directly from IRS e-file XML — your own 990/990-PF and the multi-year returns of the 109 grantees we resolved across every year we hold, several hundred filings in all (a different count from the grant rows on the cover, which are one fiscal year)— each linked to its source. Grantee achievements and outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III); we read these as association with sustained funding — the foundation is one of several forces — suppress low-confidence name matches rather than guess, and say so where a figure rests on a single grant or filing. Not everything on this page is a filed figure, and the difference matters. Filed is what you reported on your return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears. How we build these →

Generated from your IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

More from the funding graph

The unnamed billions
grants reported with no recipient in the public record
The regranting layer
51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer
The DAF merry-go-round
$9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds
The camps
funders cluster by geography, not ideology
By state
where grant money is based, and what stays home
State money flows
the interactive map of money crossing state lines