The inaugural Determination to Succeed Community Mentoring Awards Banquet is looking for some help from the local community as it looks to honor those in Madison who have been fantastic mentors in a variety of ways on April 11, 6-9 p.m. at the Goodman Community Center.
“Right now we have some very, very tight races for our Community Mentoring Award Banquet with over 530 votes in,” says Jamaal Eubanks, the founder of a variety of community organizations including Determination to Succeed, which is hosting this first annual event. “I like that we have a wide spectrum of people who are being nominated for the awards. It wasn’t just all the well-known names. It was some individuals that are doing the work in the community that maybe don’t have the same level of name recognition as others.”
For the past month, voters have been voting in five different categories in the field of mentorship: community auntie, community uncle, entrepreneur mentor, coach, and cross-generational mentor. Three finalists for each category (listed below) have made it through. The highest of these three vote-getters in each category — voting ends on Friday, March 28 — will be honored at the Determination to Succeed Community Mentoring Awards Banquet.
Eubanks wrote the book, “The Determination to Succeed,” a story of perseverance and resilience through the lens of self-reflection, for young people in the summer of 2020. Since then, he has developed The Determination to Succeed program which has been contracted by local area schools and has had a great deal of success.
At the upcoming Determination to Succeed Community Mentoring Awards Banquet, Eubanks is looking forward to the opportunity to honor the “dedication and hard work of mentors who are positively impacting the lives of people in our area.”
“This is a fundraiser which will also help us fund the 2nd annual Determination to Succeed Back2School Summit,” Eubanks says. Back in August of 2024, Eubanks hosted the inaugural Determination to Succeed Back to School Summit where many talented and brilliant young Black males were able to listen to and learn from some of Madison’s best and brightest professionals in a series of panels and workshops at an all-day event at Capital High School on Regent Street.
“Funds raised from this event will also help carry a cohort throughout the course of the school year, where we can add exposure opportunities,” Eubanks adds. “One thing that I’m thinking of is to take the cohort to the Circle City Classic, let them experience a different environment and different atmosphere while also exposing them to an educational fair where they’ll see different HBCUs.”
(Photo by A. David Dahmer)
Before the Community Mentoring Awards Banquet can happen, Eubanks is asking for help from the community to nominate deserving individuals to be honored at the event.
“This contest has been really fun. And the goal is to continue to do this every year. We want to give recognition to those individuals who may or may not receive it regularly,” Eubanks says. “But we’re also raising funds that will go towards programming for students in our community who need it.”
The two keynote speakers at the banquet will be Dr. Rainey Briggs and Kaylahn Jones. Briggs, who recently served as superintendent of Baraboo Schools, was recognized as one of Wisconsin’s 48 Most Influential Black Leaders in 2021 by Madison365. Jones pursued a Division I track career at Hampton University, a historically Black college and university (HBCU), where she earned a degree in biology and pre-medicine. She went on to become a biomedical engineer at Exact Sciences, where she spent two years working in their COVID testing and Cologuard labs.
“Kaylahn Jones is one of those students I have known since she was little and she’s turned things around in a way that literally epitomizes what mentorship is all about,” Eubanks says of the Madison La Follette High School graduate. “She’s one of the kids that when she was younger, may have gotten into a little mischief, and that’s one of the things that connected me and her. Now, any time I see her, she’s like, ‘You stayin’ out of trouble?’ She’s now in the final stages of becoming a dermatologist. She’s a pretty amazing success story.”
Eubanks adds that there are still opportunities for sponsorships and partnerships for the banquet. Tickets for the event can be purchased until April 6. In the meantime, he says, vote for your favorite Madison mentor.
“I hope as many people vote as possible. What’s great about the people that we will honor at the event is that it is 100 percent determined by the people,” Eubanks says. “I will have no hand in picking the winner, or even who got nominated or became a finalist. It’s all about who the people pick … and I love that.”
For questions about the nomination process, sponsorship packages, or the banquet, e-mail [email protected].
