The Woods Foundation
New York, NY · EIN 13-3314966. Reported 189 grants totalling $1,918,623 to 59 recipients across tax years 2020-2024. This foundation did not tell the IRS it funds only preselected organizations.
Does this foundation accept applications?
Yes -- on its own tax return. Form 990-PF asks every private foundation whether it makes grants only to organizations it selects itself. Of the 91,758 foundations in our data that made a grant and answered, 78% said yes -- and applying to those is wasted effort. The Woods Foundation did not check that box on its most recent filing, which puts it in the minority that is at least open to being approached.
How big are its grants?
The median grant is $5,000. Half of everything it gave fell between $1,000 and $10,000; the smallest was $200 and the largest $212,823. If you are asking for materially more than the top of that range, you are asking the wrong foundation.
Every organization it funded
This is the complete list from its filings, largest first. Recipients are grouped by name and state as they were written on the returns, so an organization entered under two different names appears twice. Years funded is the number of separate tax years in which that name received money.
| Organization | Location | Total received | Grants | Years funded | Last |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wildlife Conservation Society | Bronx, NY | $312,823 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| St Timothy's School | Stevenson, MA | $230,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Resources Legacy Fund | Sacramento, CA | $200,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Champions Club | Missoula, MT | $125,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Hospice of Wood River Valley | Ketchum, ID | $100,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Stanford Hoover House | Stanford, CA | $100,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Stanford Live | Stanford, CA | $90,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute | Woods Hole, MA | $65,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Santa Cruz Waldorf School | Santa Cruz, CA | $61,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| The Community Library | Kilmarnock, VA | $55,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Planned Parenthood | New York, NY | $50,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Sun Valley Writer's Conference | Santa Monica, CA | $38,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Peninsula Open Space Trust | Palo Alto, CA | $35,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Clubhouse International | New York, NY | $31,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Precourt Director's Discretionary Fund | New York, NY | $30,000 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study | Cambridge, MA | $30,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Stanford Woods Institute | Stanford, CA | $30,000 | 2 | 2 | 2022 |
| Doctors Without Borders | New York, NY | $25,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Harvard University | Cambridge, MA | $25,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Partners in Health Network Inc | Charleston, WV | $25,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation Inc | Sun Valley, ID | $25,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| The Precourt Foundation | Edwards, CO | $25,000 | 1 | 1 | 2020 |
| The Woods Institute | Washington, DC | $25,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Wood River Land Trust | Hailey, ID | $25,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Stluke Medical Center Wood River Ltd | Boise, ID | $20,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Sun Valley Music Festival | Ketchum, ID | $18,000 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| Berkshire School | Sheffield, MA | $15,000 | 3 | 3 | 2022 |
| Bonefish and Tarpon Trust | Miami, FL | $15,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Vaclav Havel Library Foundation | New York, NY | $10,000 | 1 | 1 | 2020 |
| Camphill Village USA | Copake, NY | $8,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Sun Kelly Music Festival | Ketchum, ID | $6,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Blaine County Recreation District | Hailey, ID | $5,500 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Griot Arts Inc | Clarksdale, MS | $5,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Second Stage Theatre Inc | New York, NY | $5,000 | 1 | 1 | 2020 |
| St Luke Medical Center Wood River Ltd | Boise, ID | $5,000 | 1 | 1 | 2020 |
| Wood River Community YMCA | Ketchum, ID | $5,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Council on Foreign Relations | New York, NY | $4,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Sun Valley Center for the Arts | Ketchum, ID | $4,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Advocates for Domestic Violence | Albany, NY | $3,500 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| Flourish Foundation | Ketchum, ID | $3,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Vista Life Innovations | Madison, CT | $3,000 | 3 | 3 | 2022 |
| The Marion Institute (taktse) | Marion, MA | $2,500 | 3 | 3 | 2022 |
| California Association of Food Banks | Oakland, CA | $2,000 | 1 | 1 | 2020 |
| Higher Ground | Ketchum, ID | $2,000 | 2 | 2 | 2021 |
| Hunger Coalition Inc | Boone, NC | $2,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| The Conservation Fund | Arlington, VA | $2,000 | 2 | 2 | 2021 |
| The Crisis Hot Line Inc | Bellevue, ID | $2,000 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| The Trust for Public Land | San Francisco, CA | $2,000 | 2 | 2 | 2021 |
| Friends of Galena Public Library Inc | Galena, IL | $1,500 | 3 | 3 | 2024 |
| James B Lee JR Scholarship Fund in Honor of Joseph a Mcbride | Southampton, NY | $1,500 | 2 | 2 | 2022 |
| Chuck Gates Memorial | Sun Valley, ID | $1,000 | 2 | 2 | 2021 |
| Friends of the Sawtooth National Forest Avalanche Center Inc | Ketchum, ID | $1,000 | 5 | 5 | 2024 |
| Harlem Academy | New York, NY | $1,000 | 1 | 1 | 2020 |
| Nature Coast Bridge Club | Spring Hill, FL | $1,000 | 1 | 1 | 2020 |
| Sun Valley Museum of Art | Sun Valley, ID | $1,000 | 1 | 1 | 2023 |
| Taktse Institute | Gangton, Sikkim | $1,000 | 2 | 2 | 2024 |
| Transportation Alternatives | New York, NY | $1,000 | 1 | 1 | 2020 |
| Special Olympics Inc | Washington, DC | $800 | 4 | 4 | 2024 |
| The Valley Club Scholarship Fund | Palm Desert, CA | $500 | 1 | 1 | 2021 |
45 of 59 (76%) received money in more than one year over the 5 years we hold.
Measured the way we measure every foundation -- what share of one year's grantees are funded again the next -- this one retains 78%, across 4 year-to-year transitions. The median foundation retains about 67%, so this one is unusually consistent. This measures how often it paid the same organizations again. It says nothing about whether it would consider a new one.
What kind of organizations it funds
By the activity category the IRS assigns each recipient, for the 105 grants where we could match the recipient to a registered organization. The categories are the IRS's. The match, made from the name and address on the return, is ours.
Giving by year
| Tax year | Grants | Total | Median grant |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 45 | $405,400 | $5,000 |
| 2021 | 40 | $333,700 | $5,000 |
| 2022 | 38 | $449,723 | $5,000 |
| 2023 | 30 | $395,900 | $5,000 |
| 2024 | 36 | $333,900 | $5,000 |
Tax years, not calendar years, and the most recent year is usually incomplete -- filings arrive about a year late, so a low final year means late paperwork rather than a foundation winding down.
Where its money goes
29% of its giving went to organizations in California. If your organization is based elsewhere, look in the recipient list for grants to your area before writing.
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Funders that support the same organizations
These funders gave to organizations this one also funded -- some private foundations, some community foundations and other grantmaking charities. Shared grantees are a sign of overlapping priorities and nothing more: they do not show that any of these funders would consider a new organization. Each page says what its filings show.
How to approach this foundation
- Check you are its size. The median grant is $5,000. A request many times that size asks for something it has rarely or never given.
- Check you are in its geography. Its giving is concentrated in California.
- Read the recipient list above for organizations like yours. If nothing on it resembles your work, that is a real answer, and a cheap one to get.
- Look up the current filing before writing. The 990-PF names the foundation's officers and, where one exists, its application procedure. We link it below.
Related guides
Where these numbers come from
Everything above is taken from The Woods Foundation's own Form 990-PF filings, which the IRS publishes in bulk. We used 5 returns (tax years 2020-2024). Grant figures are from its returns. Matching recipients to registered organizations, their IRS classifications, the retention rate and the funders that support the same organizations are our own calculations, described in how we build this.
Address of record on the latest return: 1271 Avenue of the Americas 42 Fl, New York, NY, 10020. This is the address the foundation gave the IRS; many small foundations file through an accountant or a bank trust department, so it may not be where post to a programme officer should go.
EIN 13-3314966 · See the original filings on ProPublica · How we build this
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