A $25 million capital campaign aims to ensure the long-term stability of a college and career readiness program that has a remarkable record producing high school graduates.
The campaign will support the Boys & Girls Clubs of Dane County’s AVID/TOPS endowment, which is a key priority within BGCDC’s fundraising effort.
AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) is a four-year elective focused on academics and skills-building, while TOPS (Teens of Promise) offers opportunities such as college visits, mentoring, internships and career exploration. The AVID/TOPS partnership combines classroom learning with real-world experiences to prepare students for success in college and careers.
Michael Johnson, president and CEO of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Dane County, said the capital campaign is about more than raising dollars for the AVID/TOPS endowment. It’s about ensuring programs that work best for youth have the resources to serve generations to come.
“We want to build up an endowment for both our school-based programs and an endowment for our club-based programs,” Johnson said. “And then we want to build up an endowment for transportation and food to make sure that we can remove barriers so our kids can eat and they can get to work and get to the club from school — and that’s pretty much the campaign.”
The BGCDC, a nonprofit youth development organization, recently received a $2 million gift from Ascendium Education Group as part of the capital campaign, but Johnson said the organization also “took a hit” — $2 million — from the federal government. That funding loss convinced the organization to establish an endowed fund for kids.
“We can do a lot of work for young people in this community and we needed a corporate boost,” he said, “and so (having) a large corporate gift like that (from Ascendium) go directly into our endowment is encouraging.
“I’m hoping others will step up and invest in our young people as well.”
For the fundraising campaign to support the endowment, Johnson said matching pledges of $5 million from Mary Burke — a former state commerce secretary and Wisconsin gubernatorial candidate whose family operates Trek Bicycle Corp. — and $5 million from John McKenzie, owner of the McKenzie Apartment Co. and founder of the McKenzie Regional Workforce Center, bring the total pledged by Labor Day to about $16 million.
Modeling success
Additional donors would support a program with an enviable record. According to the Boys & Girls Clubs of Dane County, AVID/TOPS serves over 1,140 Madison Metropolitan School District students at four high schools. After graduation, the TOPS College Success Program supports AVID/TOPS graduates as they navigate challenges in college, helping them to earn degrees.
In 2025, 234 AVID/TOPS students graduated from high school with a 100% college placement rate. The program has consistently maintained a 99% graduation rate, with 88% of participants identifying as students of color. It also has a 98% completion rate within its skilled trades core programming.
Brett Lindquist, vice president of communications and community engagement at the nonprofit Ascendium Education Group, emphasized the alignment between his organization and the Boys & Girls Clubs of Dane County. Lindquist said Ascendium’s focus is on post-secondary education and workforce training because the organization views these as a path forward for people to improve the odds of getting a new job or getting a promotion, ultimately leading to higher wages.
“So when we look at the work of the Boys & Girls Clubs, and specifically the AVID/TOPS program, we see strong alignment between our mission and their work,” Lindquist said. “The endowment aspect of it is somewhat unique, but we also view it as instrumental to establishing a consistent funding source that they can count on.
“It allows them to run the program in a way that can ultimately be more effective.”
Johnson believes BGCDC’s partnership with MMSD will serve as a national model for effective collaboration in closing the racial achievement gap. In addition to the school district’s investment in the program, Johnson gave several reasons for its success:
· First, a third-party assessment of the program is conducted by the Wisconsin Evaluation Collaborative, which is based at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Johnson said the assessment “keeps us honest” regarding the investment made in the classrooms, in staff and tutorial support.
· Second, the program employs the structured note-taking method of Cornell Notes, which helps students better understand the material presented through the curriculum.
· Third, wraparound services such as internships and career exploration — augmented by college visits — help put students on a career path.
· Fourth, there is a genuine commitment to leaving no child behind. “We don’t want students to take easy courses and we want our kids who are in the academic middle to not fall to the academic bottom,” Johnson said. “So once you get in AVID, there’s a level of rigor that we expect, and we hold our students accountable to that.”
Multiplier effect
Lindquist singled out the BGCDC for its work in education to transform lives.
“Here in Madison, there are so many great organizations that are doing good things, and so it’s hard to say that people really should be doing this instead of that,” Lindquist said. “But at the same time, we would say investments in education have a multiplying effect and it’s generational.”
Johnson is especially proud of the educational outcomes when he hears stories like that of program graduate Dr. Matida Bojang, who went on to earn a medical degree from the Medical College of Wisconsin and now is delivering babies as a first-year OB-GYN resident at UW Health.
“And now, she’s a member of our board of directors,” Johnson said. “She’s one of my bosses now.”
