North Carolina · Nonprofit
MARS HILL UNIVERSITY
MARS HILL UNIVERSITY (North Carolina) receives grants from 77 organizations whose IRS filings report $5,783,360 to it, the largest being CHARLES BURETTE MYERS TRUST FUND ($1,275,000). 41 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $62M
- Funders on record
- 77
- Grants received
- $5.8M
- Net assets
- $110M
What Mars Hill University does
Mission
Mars Hill University, an academic community rooted in the christian faith, challenges and equips students to pursue intellectual, spiritual, and personal growth that is: grounded in a rigorous study of the liberal arts, connected with the world of work, and committed to charcter development, to service, and to responsible citizenship in the commumity, the region, and the world.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Instruction - private liberal arts university offering programs leading to five degrees: bachelor of arts, science, music, social work, and fine arts. Approximately 1,051 students benefited.
$46,616,546 spentof which $27,325,886 as grants$35,867,832 earned by the program92% of program spendingAcademic support - services that are an integral part of the university's primary mission of education.
$1,400,394 spent$10,493,562 earned by the program3% of program spendingPublic service - activities established primarily to provide non-instructional services to groups external to the university.
$2,450,690 spent$1,201,755 earned by the program5% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $50,467,630.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2019 to 2020, from $147M to $159M (+8%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2017 4% · 2018 2% · 2019 2% · 2020 5% · 2021 12% · 2022 14% · 2023 4% · 2024 2% · 2025 2%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
10% of MARS HILL UNIVERSITY’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (23% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 5 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Board chair
Brent Townsend
Chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 12 funders to 31 funders, grant income rose $209k → $886k.
16 of 77 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 19% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of MARS HILL UNIVERSITY’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 77 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
MARS HILL UNIVERSITY has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 22% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
50% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund MARS HILL UNIVERSITY.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 39% · 2018 31% · 2019 54% · 2020 29% · 2021 28% · 2022 23% · 2023 28% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
44% of MARS HILL UNIVERSITY's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 53% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
MARS HILL UNIVERSITY draws 79% of its grant income from funders outside North Carolina, across 23 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.1M arriving through sponsors registered in 11 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
MARS HILL UNIVERSITY's funding base is broadening — from 12 funders to 31 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 3,758 education nonprofits $10M–$100M, FY2025
Government funding MARS HILL UNIVERSITY receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $14.5M on record.
- Department of Education$12.2M
- Department of Health and Human Services$2.0M
- Appalachian Regional Commission$200k
- Department of Agriculture$73k
- National Endowment for the Humanities$35k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like MARS HILL UNIVERSITY
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In North Carolina
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
81% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for MARS HILL UNIVERSITY: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds MARS HILL UNIVERSITY?
- MARS HILL UNIVERSITY (North Carolina) receives grants from 77 organizations whose IRS filings report $5,783,360 to it, the largest being CHARLES BURETTE MYERS TRUST FUND ($1,275,000). 41 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does MARS HILL UNIVERSITY have?
- IRS filings report 77 organizations giving $5,783,360 in grants to MARS HILL UNIVERSITY, 41 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of MARS HILL UNIVERSITY?
- CHARLES BURETTE MYERS TRUST FUND is the largest funder on record, with $1,275,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like MARS HILL UNIVERSITY find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in North Carolina. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Mars Hill University →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 77 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing