Massachusetts · Nonprofit
YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC
YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC (Massachusetts) receives grants from 34 organizations whose IRS filings report $2,805,910 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($548,333). 25 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $569k
- Funders on record
- 34
- Grants received
- $2.8M
- Net assets
- $1.5M
What Youth Advocacy Foundation Inc does
Mission
The youth advocacy foundation (yaf) is a 501(c)(3) organization and the non-profit arm of the state juvenile defender's office, whose mission is protecting and advancing the legal and human rights of children to promote their healthy development through active partnerships with local communities. Yaf's primary focus is support the clients of edlaw project, which works to shut down the cradle-to-prison pipeline in ma by ensuring that our state's most vulnerable students receive a stable and quality education through expert holistic, individual, and systemic racially-conscious, student-directed advocacy.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
The youth advocacy foundation (yaf) was established in 2001 with the mission of protecting and advancing the legal and human rights of children. For the past 24 years, yaf has remained steadfast in our commitment to ensuring that every child has access to zealous representation, essential community-based services, and a quality education. The young people we represent are students with disabilities. Getting the right education, including learning to read, is how students can escape the cycle of poverty and the school-to-prison pipeline. Yaf funds the many ways we are ensuring and enhancing the education representation that the edlaw attorneys provide, including: intake, paralegal, and legal support; dedicated social work support for our education clients; a client support program that provides needed items and services for clients such as food, clothing, supplies, transportation, housing; yaf v.o.I.c.e.s. A group for youth and parents with lived experience; resources to help attack structural racism in our schools and other institutions.
$400,825 spentof which $48,193 as grants100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $400,825.
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 2020 to 2021, from $1.0M to $1.4M (+41%).
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: 2021 7% · 2022 6% · 2025 3%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
107% of YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (84% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 3 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.
Chief executive
Marlies Spanjaard
President & CEO
Board chair
Dulcineia Goncalves
Yaf chair (dir of yad)
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 6 funders to 20 funders, grant income rose $172k → $431k.
10 of 34 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 37% 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 YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 34 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
YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 20% of grant income, and it takes 6 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 6 funders to its left
59% 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 YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 42% · 2018 29% · 2019 24% · 2020 20% · 2021 13% · 2022 27% · 2023 19% — 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
57% of YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 74% 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
YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC draws 51% of its grant income from funders outside Massachusetts, across 8 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $1.0M arriving through sponsors registered in 7 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
YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC is better cushioned than half of the 1,934 public benefit nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,934 public benefit nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2025
Government funding YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $123k on record.
- (HH) CONSULTANT SVCS (TO DEPTS)$71k
- (PP) STATE AID/POL SUB$50k
- (JJ) OPERATIONAL SERVICES$2k
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 YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION 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.
Where the money goes
68% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Part of a family of 1 related entity
- Youth Advocacy Division (Commonwealth of Ma Committee for Public Counsel) · exempt
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION 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 YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC?
- YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC (Massachusetts) receives grants from 34 organizations whose IRS filings report $2,805,910 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($548,333). 25 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC have?
- IRS filings report 34 organizations giving $2,805,910 in grants to YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC, 25 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION INC?
- FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND is the largest funder on record, with $548,333 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like YOUTH ADVOCACY FOUNDATION 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.
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 34 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