I agree! And I say this as the wife of a man who started a non-profit 
If you donât want to work through a very large charity, then donât. If your cause is local, contact your local Rotary, Knights of Columbus, and other fraternal organizations. They often take on local causes. I agree with the points about continuity and succession once the founder goes off to college. If there is not a plan in place, then itâs really little more than a vanity project.
When my S was a high school senior, a teammate was in a horrific accident. He was in the hospital for months. The teammates didnât start a nonprofit but they ran car washes, t shirt sales, etc to support the child. It went through the Boosters Club. No need to start a new organization.
Speaking as a nonprofit professional, it takes expertise to run a nonprofit the right way. You want responsible fiscal management, you need to pay for it. You need an office, phones, paper, printers, lights. Tax receipts need to be sent, and tax documents filed with the IRS. Fundraising events need to be managed. And that doesnât even begin to cover the expenses associated with the actual work being done. I love my work and my charity but am I not entitled to be paid what Iâm worth? Nobody goes into nonprofit to earn a lot of money, but we are entitled to a fair wage.
If an art museum has the choice of hiring someone at $100K who brings in $1 million, or $200k who brings in $5 million, shouldnât they hire the higher paid person?
I completely understand where the OP is coming from, but my D20 is at a non-profit summer camp right this very minute that was started by a high school student to meet a niche need. Itâs now six years later and the woman is now a college graduate and the camp is going stronger than ever- and Iâm incredibly grateful she did what she did.
A dozen years ago, I was trying to sort out specific activities that would help a group of students earn their required service hours. One teacher that I knew rejected a whole bunch of activities that had been approved by the school districtâs community service office. That teacher was convinced that the only ârealâ service projects were about designing new charitable activities and starting new non-profit organizations. Only projects that showed initiative and leadership potential counted in her mind. Helping out with an existing organization, or keeping last yearâs hot new project going werenât valid options. It made me crazy. Library books need re-shelving and babysitting during PTA meetings is a really helpful thing.
Wow, how many of you miss the point in comm service. I get the idea some here need there to be clear payback, which entirely misses the point.
Reading to kids is no big tip.
@MWolf â actually most of the people posting on the Chances threads are kids. We parents know just how silly, useless and misleading those responses are.
Try compensation in the $500K to $1.5M or more range. Meanwhile, curators with PhDs make as little as $40K in major cities,security guards $11/hour, visitor services $9/hr and no benefits, development people in the $30ks. And people complain about places like Walmart.
https://engagingplaces.net/2014/01/15/million-dollar-salaries-at-americas-biggest-museums/
From a non-athletic book worm life, I got started running marathons solely because my sister ran one and I didnât want her to be able to one up me. Experts will loudly tell you that is NOT a valid reason to run a marathon. Guess what? 40 yrs plus I am still running marathons, stopped smoking, was able to get off all medication and lead a healthy, fit lifestyle. It was the best thing I ever did. My point is, who are we to judge why someone gets into community service? Even if their motivations arenât pure in YOUR mind or YOU donât think its appropriate for them, it doesnât mean the act of partaking in community service canât have a positive impact and positive influence that ultimately changes their lives. Why limit kids from participating in their community in whatever form they see fit? If thatâs working with an existing non profit, great! If that means starting their own, great! If that means taking a break from working in the community while going to college and starting a career and picking it back up in their later years, why thatâs great too! I think its great students have the perception that getting involved with their community or making a difference will have a positive impact on their lives, because I believe it ultimately will! I would NOT discourage this one bit.
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This is an age of specialization, but who are the â(E)xperts will loudly tell you that is NOT a valid reason to run a marathonâ. Everyone I know, including myself, who has run a marathon has done it, more or less, to see if it was possible. What experts were yelling at you that you were running for the wrong reason?
And one of the points I was trying to make was that many of these HS non-profits are pet projects, and often end up like an ultimately unwanted pet. Either the parents take care of it, or it ends up in the animal shelter.
Running a charity is a ton of work, and there are definitely state and federal reporting requirements, and in most cases those requirements are, at best, an afterthought. While there may be a few success stories, Iâve encountered several which ended up being accounting train wrecks.
@crankyoldman Many issues of Runnerâs World magazine will list reasons to run a marathon and reasons NOT to run one. âBecause someone else did itâ is always listed as an invalid reason to run one. My point is, even if it looks to you that a personâs community service work was based on ulterior motives or became a train wreck , you donât know the ultimate impact it had on their life. Maybe the cat cafe that they started closed when they went to college. It doesnât mean that later in life their experience of running a cat cafe and caring about cats didnât impact their life. It also doesnât mean that was the end of their foray into community service. We know someone who ran a cat thrift store in high school but had to close it after freshman year in college. Fast forward 10 years and she now funds a stateâs entire TNR program.
Well, itâs clear weâre talking about different issues.
First, not sure who made Runners World the experts on âwhyâ someone runs a marathon. In fact, anyone claiming to judge the reasons why a person runs a marathon is just plain silly.
And nobody-at least not me-is judging anyoneâs motivation for starting a non-profit. The risk is that when donations of any kind are involved, there has to be an accounting, and few, approaching zero, of these non-profits do any sort of accounting. That is a a potential legal issue. So the success stories are wonderful, but there are dozens of others where the non-profit is like any other HS extra-curricular activity-itâs left behind after college starts. In most cases, no big deal, but if the non-profit took in any measure of donations and someone demanded an accounting, there could be problems.
@crankyoldman
âAnd nobody-at least not me-is judging anyoneâs motivation for starting a non-profit.â
This is not true. If you read the OPâs several posts in this thread, she clearly states that students are starting non profits and community service work for the perceived boost it will give them for getting into college. There is a whole post dedicated to judging particular students at her sonâs school that she believes to be disingenuous. This kind of irked me to be honest, because IMO, even if they have ulterior motives, I think the impact of any community service is positive or ultimately has the potential to be positive at some point in a persons life. I donât think it should be discouraged at all.
The OP suggests students should do work for an existing nonprofit rather than starting a new one bc she perceives there to be a limited amount of money to go around and the small amount made by Jessieâs Cat Cafe, for example, might take away from the United Way, for example. A valid point. Others have made some great points too like, (for example, not in any way meant to be actuality) the administrative costs incurred by UW are such that only 60cents of that dollar go to the actual programs for UW so they would rather support a local charity where all the money goes for actual programs. I also submit that many students donât have access to large nonprofits in their community that are important to them, and therefore that might be why they decide to start one. I donât think all that many students are actually starting 501 C 3 full on nonprofits because as someone pointed out , the costs of starting one of those are such that it lends itself to more wealthy students as they can be expensive to start. Nowadays its crowd funding and social media influencers that seem to be hip. You are right though, rules and good accounting principles should always be applied.
I totally disagree with this, it is not the OPâs (nor anyone here on CC) right to discourage or judge whether its worthy for anyone starts a non profit. If they have the idea and can find funding for it I am all for it. Discouraging ideas so that you can have access to more funding is abhorrent.
Just posting an interesting link:
6 Out-of-this World Nonprofits Masterminded by Kids
https://www.goodnet.org/articles/6-outofthisworld-nonprofits-masterminded-by-kids-list
Hereâs an article exploring the path of development of a STEM-focused nonprofit started by a 15-year-old:
https://student.societyforscience.org/blog/doing-science/she-founded-nonprofit-high-school-now-it%E2%80%99s-going-global
And hereâs a list of successful nonprofits started by college students:
https://www.onlinecollege.org/2012/10/21/20-successful-nonprofits-started-students/
I do agree that âstarting a nonprofitâ is not something that should be done for the sake of padding a college application.
AND I agree that it makes sense to do oneâs homework to find out whether there is already an effective charity or nonprofit serving the same need, and whether it makes sense to volunteer or partner with that nonprofit.
BUT â The reality is that sometimes young kids and teenagers are very passionate about one cause or another, and they shouldnât be treated with disdain simply because they are kids. The argument that there isnât enough money to go around makes no sense to me â at the startup level, the kids are reaching a different set of people than the larger well-established organizations. Itâs not as if the kids are competing for big money grants from the same major donors.
The cynic in me saysâŠit depends how well he plays football since thatâs likely what they really wanted him for.
Iâm not clear what âstart a nonprofitâ really means in this discussion. One of mine did a concert to raise $ for a local kid with cancer. They were able to give that family about $1k. Should that have gone to the American Cancer Society instead?
A good point; as maybe I took things too literally. I still think starting an actual non-profit, with all the state and federal rules that apply, is a bad idea for most teenagers. Crowdsourcing is another thing entirely, as are benefit concerts, car washes, etc etc
Just musing that this same thought could be used with starting a business too - yet how many times have we heard that students should skip college and use that money to start a business.
Overall, I think itâs wise to use judgment whether itâs which charity to support or whether or not one should turn their expertise into running their own business. Humans are not all the same. Some can handle/do great with certain things and others do better with other things.
I must travel in different circles, as Iâve never heard âmany timesâ that students should skip college and use that money to start a business. Other than that guy offering 100K to genius HS kids to skip and start(even though he was a Stanford grad himself) who is recommending this?
And yes, running a true non-profit is pretty much the same as running a business-without the profit motive, of course.
Although I wouldnât recommend it in general, it is an option I discussed with my oldest son. Not exactly the offer described - but $100k would be less than 1/2 what weâll end up paying for his college so a bargain - but getting practical experience in several other businesses first and then using a portion of the amount that would have been spent on college for a business start up fund. Iâd guess about half of my full pay friends have had similar discussions with their kids.
Edited to add: itâs not an outlandish idea for people who already have business experience and who have interests in fields that arenât terribly reliant on degrees.
@crankyoldman I suspect we definitely run in different circles. I teach in an average public high school where around 20% have college educated parents. Around here few very aim for Ivies (or similar). If that Princeton Review Dream College question were asked of our parents/students I suspect Penn St would be #1 on both lists and most of the schools on the ârealâ list wouldnât even make the rankings.
Itâs not really a surprise that starting a business is suggested as a better alternative to college, nor is it a surprise (to me) when many businesses fail. Iâm not even surprised when I see some students take over their parentâs business and it later fails. (Not all students, but some.)
We donât have kids starting non-profits here for their college apps. 
We definitely have some who are big on community service of various types, but that doesnât really have anything to do with non-profits specifically. It might include fund raising for a cause. It definitely can include volunteering.