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Tennessee · Nonprofit

UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH

UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH (Tennessee) receives grants from 217 organizations whose IRS filings report $36,623,327 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($3,704,142). 142 of them have funded it in more than one year.

$246M
Revenue FY2025
217
Funders on record
$37M
Grants received
$785M
Net assets
142/217 repeat funderspeak grant-dependency 4%

Against its field

UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH runs a healthier operating margin than three-quarters of the 671 education nonprofits its size.

Operating margin21% · top quartile
Months of reserve3.9mo · top quartile
Revenue growth (annualized)5% · below the median

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 671 education nonprofits over $100M, FY2025

Three funders worth looking at

Grantmakers with no record of funding this organization, ranked by how strongly the co-funder graph and the mission embeddings agree. The evidence is in section 03.

See all 12 prospects and why each one surfaced →
01The organization over time

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.

100 = 20172017 Revenue 100 ($171M) Expenses 100 ($134M) Net assets 100 ($595M)2018 Revenue 97 ($165M) Expenses 107 ($143M) Net assets 104 ($619M)2019 Revenue 96 ($164M) Expenses 109 ($146M) Net assets 107 ($637M)2020 Revenue 94 ($161M) Expenses 112 ($150M) Net assets 109 ($647M)2021 Revenue 150 ($256M) Expenses 110 ($147M) Net assets 128 ($763M)2022 Revenue 52 ($88M) Expenses 125 ($167M) Net assets 114 ($679M)2023 Revenue 103 ($175M) Expenses 129 ($173M) Net assets 119 ($709M)2024 Revenue 113 ($193M) Expenses 140 ($187M) Net assets 125 ($747M)2025 Revenue 144 ($246M) Expenses 145 ($194M) Net assets 132 ($785M)
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Revenue (144)Expenses (145)Net assets (132)Peer revenue range

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.

2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

Government-grant reliance: 2017 0% · 2018 0% · 2019 0% · 2020 1% · 2021 1% · 2022 4% · 2023 1% · 2024 1% · 2025 1%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.

8% of UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (14% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 729 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.

$37M
17
$22M
18
$18M
19
$11M
20
$109M
21
$79M
22
$2.5M
23
$5.4M
24
$52M
25
3.9
months of
reserve
02Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 58 funders to 94 funders, grant income fell $4.5M → $4.2M.

47 of 217 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF)42% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.

Left out of every figure on this page: $103k from one payer (the payer shares this organization's board, largest South Cumberland Community Fund). These are real filings, and they are not money UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH raised.

From the IRS filings of UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 217 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

UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 10% of grant income, and it takes 9 funders to reach half.

the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 9 funders to its left

49% 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 UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH.

10%
largest funder
27%
top three
~25
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 45% · 2018 24% · 2019 28% · 2020 10% · 2021 13% · 2022 12% · 2023 10%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

47% of UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 65% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y+4y+5y+6y

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

UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH draws 94% of its grant income from funders outside Tennessee, across 33 states in all.

WA
IL
WI
NY
MA
OR
NV
IN
OH
PA
NJ
CT
RI
CA
MO
VA
MD
DE
NM
KS
AR
TN
NC
SC
DC
HI
OK
LA
MS
AL
GA
TX
FL

In-state vs out-of-state, by year

17
18
19
20
21
22
23
Tennessee out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $15M arriving through sponsors registered in 22 statesis 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.

03Its place in the field

Funders to approach

Grantmakers that don’t fund you yet, surfaced two ways: they back organizations that share your funders, or their grantees resemble your mission. The ones both signals agree on come first. Your 217 funders put you under-funded among the 400 organizations that share them.

From the co-funder graph (funders backing at least two comparable organizations, shrunk for grantee count, donor-advised and mega-funds excluded) and the universe embeddings. A research starting point; overlap is association, not a guarantee of fit.

Government funding UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH receives

Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $8.2M on record.

Federal$8.2M
grants $8.2Mcontracts $0
17
18
19
20
21
22
24
25
Top agencies
  • Department of Education$5.5M
  • Corporation for National and Community Service$1.1M
  • National Science Foundation$893k
  • Department of Health and Human Services$305k
  • Department of Justice$288k
  • Department of the Interior$53k

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 UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH

Nonprofits whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over the universe of US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.

In Tennessee

Nationally

04Profile & governance

Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.

Where the money goes

88% of spending goes to programs.

Program 88%Management 11%Fundraising 2%

Governance

171
board members
97%
independent
Conflict-of-interest policyWhistleblower policyDocument retentionBoard reviewed the 990Audited financials

Footprint & structure

Files a return copy in 9 states

CA
CO
NE
NM
AR
TN
OK
GA
FL

Part of a family of 1 related entity

  • Sewanee Village Ventures Inc · corp_trust

Screen this organization

A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH: 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.

A paid feature, included from the $75 plan up. Sign in to download.

Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf

Questions and answers

Who funds UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH?
UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH (Tennessee) receives grants from 217 organizations whose IRS filings report $36,623,327 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($3,704,142). 142 of them have funded it in more than one year.
How many funders does UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH have?
IRS filings report 217 organizations giving $36,623,327 in grants to UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH, 142 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH?
FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND is the largest funder on record, with $3,704,142 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Tennessee. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.

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 217funders 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 August 27, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing