Boys & Girls Clubs of America

NOMINATOR COMMENTS

BGCA’s leadership team has collaborated with Capital Group and Milliman to find ways to encourage employees at every career stage to plan for retirement. The mission was to enhance retirement outcomes for underserved groups by making retirement planning accessible to everyone within the organization. It was clear to the organization that merely providing content and tools was not having enough of an impact. Increasing awareness and engagement was critical to achieving the desired results.

BGCA has a franchise-like model where participants are employees of the local BGCA chapter (e.g., employees of Boys and Girls Club of Atlanta). BGCA National offers a “master retirement plan” that local clubs can choose to adopt. Currently, about 80 clubs have adopted the master retirement plan, covering approximately 5,300 401(k) eligible participants. Each club has the flexibility to set its own plan design features, such as auto-enroll rate and auto-escalate rate. This variability added complexity to the data implementation process, as each club had its own retirement plan options. Launched as a complement to the American Funds Target Date Retirement Series, the ICanRetire program from Capital Group includes tailored tools and resources that educate employees on retirement planning and savings. The first step in building the ICanRetire program involved partnering with Milliman to gather all the data for BGCA participants.

Employees do not receive direct communications from BGCA National. Instead, they hear from their club leadership, with BGCA clubs spread out across the U.S. To engage participants effectively, ICanRetire and BGCA collaborated by attending national and regional conferences hosted by BGCA in multiple cities across the U.S.

Pam West (middle)

PLANSPONSOR: Please cite any noteworthy initiatives you have taken in the past 24 to 36 months that have produced results to improve your plan, and describe the results.

BGCA: Morningstar Retirement Manager and ICanRetire by Capital Group were successfully launched in November 2023. The average deferral rate increased to 7.64% from 3.8% for 104 participants as of September 30, 2024. We partnered with Capital Group and Milliman to expand focus on participants’ Retirement Income Security Evaluation Score and participant education and engagement (via deferral percentage increases) to maximize the value derived.

We celebrated National 401(k) Day with targeted employee communications in the HR newsletter over five weeks to promote participation in the 401(k) plan. These included 401(k) Fun Facts, FAQs, completing the RISE score assessment and ICanRetire.

As of December 31, 2024, total participants with a RISE score increased to 202 from 185 —an increase of 35.8%—exceeding our goal.

PLANSPONSOR: Please explain the ongoing governance efforts of those involved with the plan meant to ensure its compliance and effective operation.

BGCA: We have a Board Retirement Committee, with three active sub-committees (investment, compliance, communications) that are tasked with overseeing the retirement plan. Meetings are held four times per year and more frequently if needed.

The Board Retirement Committee conducts an annual review of the charter and bylaws, investment policy statement and fiduciary governance calendar. All members participate in yearly fiduciary training by ERISA counsel.

This year, for our Plan Sponsor of the Year profiles, we are publishing Q&As based on the finalists’ applications and nominator comments. Responses are edited and may be paraphrased. In cases where the finalist self-nominated or, on its application, referred judges to the nomination for the answer, we have attributed those nominator answers to the plan sponsor.