Young Writers Project Inc
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 205231693
- IRS 990-EZ coverage
- 2009–2024
- Forms available
- Form 990 2019, Form 990-EZ 2024
- Location
- Burlington, VT, USA
- Phone
- 8023249538
- Rating
- 73
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Moderate
- Sector
- Youth Development Programs
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $136,532
- Expenses
- $139,827
- Assets
- $108,759
- Liabilities
- $171
Source: IRS Form 990-EZ. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
9 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- Hillary Read (Board President)
- Aimee Picchi (Board Vice-President)
- Susan Reid (Executive Director)
People named in this filing
- Giovanna Di Paola Jager (board Member)
- Erin Bundock (board Member)
- Jacques Bailly (Board Member)
Selected names, not a complete roster or a statement of current roles. Open leadership details for the complete filed list.
Source: IRS Form 990-EZ. Selected filing: tax year 2024. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
Young Writers project (YWP) is an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit that began in 2006 in Burlington, VT. Our mission is to inspire, mentor, publish, and promote young writers and artists. With the support of individual donors, foundations, and businesses, all programming is free of charge so that any youth, ages 13-19, can join our creative community. Most of our teen members are from Vermont and around the Northeast. Our website, youngwritersproject.org, is the heart of YWP, a community of teen writers and visual artists who post to their own blogs and connect with each other online, receive support and mentoring, and submit their work for publication. From more than 10,000 annual submissions to our website, we select the best work for publication with our Vermont media partners, and in our monthly literary magazine, The Voice, and annual anthology.
What it reported doing in 2024
Publications: Since Young Writers Project started in 2006, we have published some 27,000 writers and artists in our 16 anthologies, 134 digital magazine issues, and with our Vermont media partners. In fall 2025, we published Anthology 16, our collection of writing and art from the 2024-2025 school year. In this edition, our opinion section draws from a new civic engagement initiative that we began in February 2025 called The Tomorrow Project. During the year, we also published a monthly issue of The Voice, our digital magazine of poetry, commentary, and art. Our complementary disciplines of writing and visual art continue to strengthen our website and publications. We have seen submissions of visual art double on our website since we introduced a special ArtSpace section and added a homepage art gallery and regular art contests and challenges. Throughout the year, our teen writers and artists were also featured with our Vermont media partners - VTDigger.org, Vermont Public, the Rutland Herald, the Barre-Montpelier Times Argus, and Seven Days.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Donor-supported. 98% of the money available for current operations came from contributions and gifts.
- Distribution model
- Direct operator. The filing allocates 100% of reported program-service expenses outside its grant, affiliate-payment, and member-benefit lines. This expense classification does not rule out separately announced grant awards.
The verdict
SUPPORTED - The filed numbers largely add up and a large share of available resources goes toward mission work. Program spending has declined or grown slowly and revenue has declined or grown slowly.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 61
- Transparency & Controls: 100
- Sustainability: 34
- Growth: 20
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 61%; rating input score 61
- Program expense ratio: 59.5%; rating input score 60
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 52nd percentile among comparable filings
- Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
Sustainability
- Operating margin: -2.4%; rating input score 27; 27th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.78; rating input score 51; 51st percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0; rating input score 50; 50th percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 53.6%; rating input score 4; 4th percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: -3.5% per year; rating input score 0; 21st percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: -3.1% per year; rating input score 0; 12th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 7.1% per year; rating input score 100; 52nd percentile among comparable filings
Details
- Where the money goes: 61% of revenue deployed · 59.5% of spending went to programs
- Governance: Filed governance answers
- Accomplishments: 3 filed program accomplishments · $83K in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $0 · 9 people listed
- Consistency: 8 of 8 current checks pass
- Schedules: 3 filed schedules
- Filing history: 7 filing years from 2009 to 2024
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 2 filed money-flow records
- Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
- People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.
Key Signals
Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.
- High — Growth: Program expense growth scored 0/100.
- High — Growth: Revenue growth scored 0/100.
- High — Sustainability: Operating margin scored 27/100.
- Review — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 51/100.
- High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 4/100.
- Review — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 50/100.