Network & Mentoring Member Bio

Carter Savage is Vice President of Program & Youth Development Services for Boys & Girls Clubs of America. He has 18 years of experience with local Clubs and the National organization, and oversees a wide range of program initiatives including education, technology, health & life skills, arts, sports, fitness & recreation as well as program planning and evaluation.

Carter joined the Boys Clubs of Jackson, Tennessee at age seven and advanced professionally in the Movement from a part-time employee while an undergraduate at Vanderbilt University to positions of Education Director and Associate Executive Director at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Middle Tennessee.

Carter joined national staff in 1999, and until early 2001 he managed education programs, including a comprehensive education enhancement initiative, Project Learn, designed to supplement what youth ages 6-18 learn in school. Developed by BGCA, funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and evaluated by Dr. Stephen Schinke of Columbia University, Project Learn provides academic enrichment through tutoring and homework assistance, leisure learning activities, parental involvement, school collaborations and rewards for participating youth. In May 2001, he was promoted to Vice President, Youth Development Services.

Carter holds a Doctorate degree in Education, a Master’s in Public Policy (Program Development and Program Evaluation) and a Bachelor’s Degree in Mathematics from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. He has published several scholarly articles, magazine articles and book chapters on the history of education for African-Americans in the South, the social context of education for at-risk youth, the theoretical framework of after-school programs, and the development of after-school education programs. Co-edited with V.P. Franklin of Columbia University, his first book, Cultural Capital and Black Education, was published in December 2004. Carter Savage is currently a Fellow at the W.E.B. DuBois Institute at Harvard University where he is researching the history of African-Americans in the Boys & Girls Club Movement.