Celebrate Badgers™ Making a Difference

In the winter of 2003, homeless teen Elijah McCloskey stumbled upon Freewheel Bicycle Co. — then a scrappy group of local activists in an unheated warehouse who helped him build his own bicycle for free. From there, Elijah used that bike to get a job — the job that helped him find housing — and eventually create the stability to apply to UW™ and graduate with a business degree. Since his life-changing free bicycle, Elijah has since become the Executive Director of Freewheel Bicycle Co. which gives away over 12,000 bikes to others in need all over the world, teaches free bike building and repair classes to 6,000 students, and diverts over a thousand tons of waste from the landfill. He’s currently looking forward to launching the Madison Bicycle Resource Center on the Capitol Square in the near future.

Victoria Matson is the founder of A Moment of Magic Foundation at UW-Madison®, which provides medically vulnerable children with creative programming, outlets, and support to foster imagination, friendship, and hope. Her organization’s college-student volunteers dress up as princesses and superheroes and attend individual visits, group visits, and special events with nonprofits and hospitals across the Midwest. Today, A Moment of Magic has reached over 30,000 children nationally, and approximately a thousand children in Wisconsin. When a child is hospitalized, treatments and diagnoses become a priority for parents and doctors, but Victoria’s foundation encourages each child to be brave, strong, and fearless throughout their medical journey — while providing them with opportunities to ‘just be a kid.’