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Worth Thomas Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Worth Thomas Foundation

Its FY2021 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$39k
Granted FY2021
11
Grants FY2021
2
States reached
$16k
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its fieldRead
01What it funds
01FY2021 · 11 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2021

  • Under $10k10 grants · $23k
  • $10k–50k1 grant · $16k
$1,000
Median grant
2
States reached
$3k
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
TOUGALOO COLLEGE$16,000
JSU DEVELOPMENT FOUNDATION$7,000
Individual grant recipient$5,000
MISSISSIPPI CIVIL RIGHTS MUSEUM$5,000
Individual grant recipient$2,500
MISSISSIPPI FOOD NETWORK$1,000
LEFLEURS BLUFFMS CHAPTER THE LINKS INCORPORATED$1,000
COMMUNITY FOUNDATION FOR MISSISSIPPI$500
MISSISSIPPI ECONOMIC COUNCIL$300
MEN OF HONOR$200
100 BLACK MEN OF JACKSON INC$100
02The need
02

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Dollar for dollar, its grants (FY21–21) land where the poverty rate runs at 16%, against an area that typically sits at 16%. 40% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants skew toward lower-need ZIPs.

area typical 16%BLUE RIDGE YMCA: $5k → 12%TOUGALOO COLLEGE: $16k → 11%100 BLACK MEN OF JACKSON INC: $100 → 23%MEN OF HONOR: $200 → 23%MISSISSIPPI CIVIL RIGHTS MUSEUM: $5k → 23%MISSISSIPPI FOOD NETWORK: $1k → 23%COMMUNITY FOUNDATION FOR MISSISSIPPI: $500 → 23%JSU DEVELOPMENT FOUNDATION: $7k → 23%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount
How this is measured
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.
How this is measured
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.
03Its field
03the grantee network

7 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. 7 of the 11 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.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
0
Early backer (in before they grew)
7/7
Grantees still filing
2/7
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Tougaloo College: $16,000 · EducationTougaloo CollegeJackson State University Development Foundation Inc: $7,000 · EducationJackson State University Development Foundation IncIndividual grant recipient: $5,000 · OtherIndividual grant recipientMISSISSIPPI CIVIL RIGHTS MUSEUM: $5,000 · OtherMISSISSIPPI CIVIL RIGHTS MUSEUMIndividual grant recipient: $2,500 · OtherIndividual grant recipientLINKS INC LINKS INC LEFLEURS BLUFF CHAPTER: $1,000 · OtherLINKS INC LINKS INC LEFLEURS BLUFF CHAPTE…+3 more: $600 · OtherMISSISSIPPI FOOD NETWORK INC: $1,000 · Food & NutritionCOMMUNITY FOUNDATION FOR MISSISSIPPI: $500 · Philanthropy
Education$23,000Other$14,100Food & Nutrition$1,000Philanthropy$500

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$100k$1.0M$10Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetTougaloo College: $16,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetJackson State University Development Foundation Inc: $7,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetMISSISSIPPI FOOD NETWORK INC: $1,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetLINKS INC LINKS INC LEFLEURS BLUFF CHAPTER: $1,000 over 1y, 2.1% of budgetCOMMUNITY FOUNDATION FOR MISSISSIPPI: $500 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetMISSISSIPPI ECONOMIC COUNCIL: $300 over 1y, 0.0% of budget100 BLACK MEN OF JACKSON INC: $100 over 1y, 0.0% of budget
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.

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.

WK Kellogg FoundationEnterprise Holdings F…Morgan Stanley Global…Network for GoodAmerican Online Givin…Fidelity Investments …Amazonsmile Foundation
WK Kellogg FoundationMI13× affinity4 shared granteesties to 6 of 6Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: WK Kellogg Foundation · Enterprise Holdings Foundation · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · Network for Good · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation

How this is measured
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization Worth Thomas Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Worth Thomas Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 00%0%1%3%5%funder's share of their income ↑0%19%38%56%75%share of the org’s income from government →
    no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
    0get no government money at all
    3report 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
    How this is measured
    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 a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than 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 to 24 months.

    On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 11 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

    How this is measured
    Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its 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.

    Generated from the IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2021, released 2021. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

    Source object · view filing

    Play a game based on Worth Thomas’ filings →

    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 endowment market
    who holds foundation money, and what just moved
    The camps
    funders cluster by geography, not ideology
    By state
    where grant money is based, and what stays home