Privacy Policy

1. Who we are

Youth Architecture Opportunities (“YAO”, “we”) is a student-led nonprofit organization. This policy explains what information we collect through this website and member portal, why we collect it, and the choices you have. Because many of our members are minors, we hold ourselves to a conservative standard for data handling.

2. Information we collect

Application data: name, email, school, grade level, program interests, and your application answers.

Account data: your Google account email and name when you sign in with Google. We never see or store your Google password.

Participation data: event signups, attendance, volunteer hours, project space membership, task activity, and messages sent inside the portal.

Technical data: basic logs (IP address, browser type, timestamps) used for security, rate limiting, and abuse prevention.

3. How we use information

To review applications and operate programs; to assign you to project spaces; to track and verify volunteer hours; to send confirmations, reminders, and program updates; to keep the community safe; and to publish aggregate statistics (never individual data) such as total volunteer hours.

We do not sell personal information. We do not use member data for advertising.

4. Who can see your information

Role-based access controls limit visibility: volunteers see their own records; project managers see members of their assigned spaces; admins see organization-wide records needed to run programs. Contact details inside a project space are visible only to that space's members and managers.

We share data with service providers solely to operate the site (hosting, database, email delivery, Google Workspace). Each processes data on our instructions.

5. Students and minors

Programs are designed for middle and high school students. We collect the minimum information needed to run programs. Parents or guardians may request a copy, correction, or deletion of their student's data at any time by emailing hello@youtharchitectureopportunities.org.

6. Data retention

Application records for unaccepted applicants are deleted after 12 months. Member records are retained while your account is active. Verified hour logs are retained for 4 years so alumni can request service documentation. You may request earlier deletion at any time.

7. Security

We use encrypted connections (HTTPS), role-based permissions enforced at the database level, audit logs of administrative actions, and environment-protected credentials. No system is perfectly secure; if we learn of a breach affecting your data we will notify affected members promptly.

8. Your choices

You can unsubscribe from the newsletter with one click; request access, correction, or deletion of your data; and close your account at any time. Closing your account removes portal access immediately and queues personal data for deletion.

9. Changes & contact

We will post any changes to this policy here and note the effective date. Questions: hello@youtharchitectureopportunities.org.

Effective date: June 2026. This document is a working draft prepared by the web team and should be reviewed by a qualified adult advisor before launch.