About Youth Communication - Reprinting Rules

Guidelines for Reprinting Material Which Has Appeared in
Youth Communication Publications

(Revised 08/16/2005)

We are eager to get new readers for our stories and have created ways to make that easy to do. However, because of the great cost and effort involved in creating our stories, we are also very protective of them. Unless you fall into the category of people who can download stories for free (see below), please do not reprint our copyrighted stories without getting written permission and paying appropriate fees. (All fees go to support our teen writing program.)

Using our stories for free

There are a few instances when you can use our stories for free. They are described in this section. If the criteria in this section do not apply to you, proceed to the next section to find the rules you must follow.

If you want to download a full-text story from this site just for yourself or a friend, you may do so. So, if you're a teen and you want to download a story to keep or to give to a friend who you think would like it, you are free to do so.

Also, if you will be making fewer than 30 copies for one-time use in a nonprofit educational setting, we will automatically grant you permission to download and copy it for free. Simply send us an e-mail telling us the story you'd like to use and how you will use it and we'll e-mail permission right back.

For example, if you're a teacher and you want to download the full-text of a story to use for discussion in a middle-school advisory group or as a model for a high school English class, just drop us a request and we'll grant you permission. The same thing goes for a social worker who wants to share a story with a teen in foster care, or a trainer at a foster care agency who would like to use a story to prompt discussion in a workshop.

But keep in mind that if you want to reprint the story in a curriculum that you use in many classes or year after year, or a training manual, or an agency newsletter, then you must read and follow the detailed reprint rules in the next section and pay us a fee.

All fees go to support our teen writing programs.

A. Commercial Organizations and Large Nonprofits

Our standard reprint fee for one-time, non-exclusive North American rights for commercial organizations is your standard rate, or $300 per article, whichever is higher. For example, if you customarily pay 25 cents a word, the fee for a 1,000-word article is $250. The fee for reprinting illustrations is $100. Commercial reprint requests should include the same information requested in steps 1-3 below for non-commercial uses.

B. Small Nonprofit Organizations

Our standard reprint fee for small nonprofit organizations for one-time, non-exclusive North American rights is $45 per article and $15 per illustration. Groups that fit this category typically include foster parent newsletters, for example.

If your nonprofit organization ever pays other staff or consultants for reprint rights or writing services, or it is a large agency with a budget of over $500,000, then you should propose to us your standard payment, but no less than $45-see Commercial and Large Nonprofit Rates, above.

For us to evaluate your reprint request you must submit a letter or e-mail with the following information:

Which article you want to reprint, and where you want to reprint it (for example, a newsletter, a conference packet, etc.).
The circulation (for example, "In our newsletter, Youth Now, which is circulated to teenagers in southern California," or "In the conference packet which will be distributed to 1,000 participants at the annual meeting of the Children's Defense Fund," or "On a CD-ROM with a pressing of 5,000 for high school English teachers in Ohio."
Why you want to reprint it: Please tell us in a few sentences why you want to reprint a particular article, and why you expect it will be useful to your audience. Be as specific as possible. Our writers and staff really like to know what stands out for you in our materials.

C. Attribution

If we grant you permission to reprint the articles, and we almost always do when you follow the above steps, it is important to us that you properly attribute the article when it appears in your publication. You must include a credit line that reflects your use of the material as described below.

"Reprinted from..." If the article appears intact, except for minor copy editing to conform to your publication's style, or very slight cutting for space reasons, you must use the credit line, "reprinted from..." one of our publications,
"Excerpted from..." If you are reprinting an intact, unedited portion of a longer essay, the credit should read "excerpted from..." one of our publications.
"Condensed from..." If you cut many complete sentences or paragraphs to fit your space requirements, the credit should read "condensed from..." to signal to the reader that they are not reading the essay as the writer originally wrote it, but rather a condensed version.

If you are adapting or condensing an article, you must fax us a copy for review prior to publication. Fax: 212-279-8856, attn: Loretta Chan.

Attribution Language

Here is a generic credit line to adapt depending on the circumstances described above and the publication you are reprinting from.

"Reprinted [excerpted] [condensed] with permission from [New Youth Connections] or [Represent], Copyright 200X by Youth Communication/New York Center, Inc. (www.youthcomm.org)."

Note: If the article you are reprinting has appeared in one of our anthologies, the credit line should include the name of the book. We will provide you with the exact attribution.

Upon publication of the article, you must send us two copies of the hard copy publication (book, magazine, CD-ROM, etc.) in which it appeared, one for our files, and one which we can give to the teen writer or illustrator. If the reprint is on a website, send us an e-mail with the URL when the article is posted.

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For more information, contact Loretta Chan, LChan@Youthcomm.org

Click Here for a Sample Permission Request Letter