Massachusetts · Nonprofit
SWEET READERS INC
SWEET READERS INC (Massachusetts) receives grants from 10 organizations whose IRS filings report $159,335 to it, the largest being NATIONAL PHILANTHROPIC TRUST ($98,500). 5 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 62% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2024
- $18k
- Funders on record
- 10
- Grants received
- $159k
- Net assets
- $8k
What Sweet Readers Inc does
Mission
Sweet readers builds communities around the transformational interaction between trained middle school students and isolated older adults, most living with some form of dementia. Our mission is to inspire young people, through training, multigenerational programs and immersive community events, to revitalize adults living with dementia and become catalysts to improve healthcare for all. Our facilitated programs, based in language and the arts and infused with science, are housed in museums, community centers, school classrooms and elder care centers. In fy24, we streamlined our programs as our focus continued to be on developing a model to scale sweet readers' impact, driven by youth and their school communities while virtually eliminating the need for overhead costs and unnecessary infrastructure.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990-EZ.
Programs
In fy23 this manhattan sweet readers program resumed in person programming, housed in school classrooms. This program, in its 11th year with sweet readers, brought together students from an all girls school on manhattan's upper east side with older adults from two upper east side eldercare residents. During the facilitated programs, sweet readers and their adult partners explored the concepts of gathering, community and the traditions and impacts of sharing meals together during a special community table curriculum. The entire 6th grade, 56 students, engaged with approximately 20 adult participants over the course of the year. One of the eldercare partners hosted a community dinner to extend the engagement and its impact for sweet readers, school faculty and their families and sweet readers held a year end gathering to further engage the residents and their care partners with sweet readers and their families, at the jewish museum. Sweet readers were engaged, on average, 8 hours per school year and the adults, 18 hours. A significant portion of the program costs were absorbed by the school who paid teachers to facilitate the programs and for snacks; the eldercare partner who paid…
$45,180 spent29% of program spendingConnecticut sweet readers was our second largest program in terms of net revenues and of numbers of students served. Connecticut sweet readers successfully completed their eleventh year of sweet readers, consistently serving most of their 8th grade students, approximately 67 in number. Each of 6 programs was comprised of a training session, five intergenerational program sessions and a reflection session. Average student engagement was 7 hours per program. During program sessions, students and their older adult partners explored and created poetry as they discovered each other. Adult participants and their care partners were engaged in multiple programs throughout the school year, for an average total engagement of approximately 20 hours. A significant part of the program costs were absorbed by the school who paid teachers to facilitate the programs, the eldercare partner who paid aides to facilitate on their end, with their residents and for transportation and our trained young leaders (select high school students who served as sweet readers when they were in the middle school) who helped to develop the curriculums and facilitate the program sessions. Total cost to sweet readers,…
$45,180 spent29% of program spendingIn this, our third largest program, the entire 5th grade of a title 1 charter school in the harlem section of manhattan, traveled to a social adult day program in washington heights, new york. During the program sessions participants explored the concepts of community, family and the community table as they shared their stories, created their own multimedia community table, discovered each other and bridged their communities. 23 students were engaged through training, multigenerational programming and community events for a total of approximately 10 hours per school year. Their 15 adult partners were engaged for approximately 10 hours. While the vast majority of program expense was born by the eldercare center who contributed the space and the aides who helped to set up the room and facilitate and the school who paid for transportation and the cost of their faculty to facilitate. The cost to sweet readers, comprised of training, site visits, administration and logistics, was approximately $15,579.18. This program was delivered to both the school and eldercare center free of charge.
$15,579 spent10% of program spendingOther programseven as sweet readers reduced the number of programs in order to focus on testing and evaluating new models for scale, in addition to the three largest sweet readers communities and programs summarized above, sweet readers still managed to provide programming which bridged 3 additional communities, comprised of 7 additional programs, serving approximately 500 participants comprised of middle school students, high school students, art educators, middle school educators, adults with dementia and their care partners. Because sweet readers communities are self-sustaining within 3-4 years, typically with diminishing expenses each year, coupled with the fact that our program partners are vested stakeholders and generous professional services were provided on a pro bono basis, the total net cost to sweet readers, comprised of development, site visits, training and evaluation for those 7 programs was $49,853
$49,853 spent32% of program spending
The 4 programs described on its FY2022 Form 990-EZ. Program spending in total: $155,792.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2018, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2018, 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 $298k to $263k (−12%).
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.
17% of SWEET READERS INC’s revenue is contributions — more earned-revenue than three-quarters of its peers (100% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 5 of the last 6 reported years ran a deficit.
Leadership and staff
Chief executive
Karen Young
President/CEO/treasurer
As listed on its FY2022 Form 990-EZ.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base held at 3 funders, grant income rose $8k → $26k.
2 of 10 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 62% 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 SWEET READERS INC’s funders (the co-funder graph). 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
SWEET READERS INC leans on a few funders — its largest provides 62% of grant income and the top three 87%; half comes from just 1 funder.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 1 funder to its left
62% 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 SWEET READERS INC.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 72% · 2018 63% · 2019 83% · 2020 40% · 2021 95% · 2022 95% · 2023 95% — growing more concentrated.
“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
50% of SWEET READERS INC's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 50% 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
62% of SWEET READERS INC's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $61k that is directly attributable, 100% of it comes from funders outside Massachusetts, across 3 states.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $99k arriving through sponsors registered in 2 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
SWEET READERS INC's revenue fell 85% between 2018 and 2024.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 9,898 health nonprofits under $100k, FY2024
Organizations like SWEET READERS INC
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 Massachusetts
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Public support
64%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 2 states
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for SWEET READERS INC: 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 SWEET READERS INC?
- SWEET READERS INC (Massachusetts) receives grants from 10 organizations whose IRS filings report $159,335 to it, the largest being NATIONAL PHILANTHROPIC TRUST ($98,500). 5 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 62% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does SWEET READERS INC have?
- IRS filings report 10 organizations giving $159,335 in grants to SWEET READERS INC, 5 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of SWEET READERS INC?
- NATIONAL PHILANTHROPIC TRUST is the largest funder on record, with $98,500 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like SWEET READERS INC find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Massachusetts. 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 Sweet Readers →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2018–2024), and the filings of 10 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