Beginning June 2026, Badger Volunteers will rebrand its program’s values and logistics to incorporate varying levels of more meaningful service opportunities.
Since the program’s inception in 2008, Badger Volunteers has provided UW-Madison students semester-long volunteer opportunities that pairs them with community organizations to volunteer one to four hours each week at the same organization.
The focus of Badger Volunteers will be to ensure students that the program provides multiple entry points aside from its original volunteer model. Moving forward, students interested in semester-long mentoring and tutoring and one-time opportunities will be able find them under the umbrella of Badger Volunteers.
“We want all UW-Madison students engaged in serving our community partners throughout the greater community to be recognized as a Badger Volunteer, regardless of time commitment,” says José Luis Ramirez, Jr., Morgridge Center for Public Service assistant director of civic engagement.
Three new models will now be a focus of Badger Volunteers, which will let students identify which opportunity they would be interested in. They are Activate, Elevate and Educate.
- Badger Volunteers Activate: One-time or flexible and episodic ways to get involved in the community while exploring causes you care about.
- Badger Volunteers Elevate: Our original program. An 11-week volunteer commitment throughout the semester focused on building meaningful relationships and consistent community engagement. Register for a consistent one to four hour weekly volunteer opportunity based on your interest and schedule.
- Badger Volunteers Educate: School-based mentorship and tutoring. Students will develop meaningful relationships with K-12 youth through mentorship, enrichment literacy and/or math skill building. Students will also participate in comprehensive ongoing training and professional development led by community-based, district and school experts. There will be paid opportunities for work study-eligible students interested in supporting local youth with literacy and/or math skill building.
“These expected changes to our Badger Volunteers program will not interrupt with the logistics that have been employed by the program,” says Ramirez.
Transportation options for volunteers will still be offered to any student participating in any of the three Badger Volunteers model. Students will be able to use our transportation providers such as Lyft, UW–Madison Fleet and Union Cab to get to their community site, as long as it’s more than 35 minutes away by bus from the UW-Madison campus.
A flagship program of the Morgridge Center for Public Service that has accumulated over 320,000 service hours, Badger Volunteers will continue its mission of creating and cultivating mutually respectful and beneficial partnerships across campus and the city of Madison.
“We are excited for these changes to Badger Volunteers” says Ramirez. “The new off-campus partnerships, spectrum of engagement levels, and work study opportunities widens avenues for our UW-Madison students to participate meaningfully in addressing community-identified issues by leveraging university resources.”