Gift from Vertex Founder and Wife Pushes Building Our Future Campaign Past $35M Goal
Donation will be Matched by Anonymous Donor, to be Presented at June 27 Reception
BOSTON, June 19, 2025–The Boston Arts Academy Foundation, a charitable nonprofit organization that raises essential funds from private philanthropic sources to support the Boston Arts Academy, the city’s only public high school for visual and performing arts, announced it has exceeded a $35 million campaign goal with a $1 million gift by Drs. Amy and Joshua Boger and an anonymous matching donation. Dr. Joshua Boger will present the donation at a lunch reception alongside Mayor Michelle Wu, the honorary chairperson of the Building Our Future Campaign, June 27 at The Parkman House.
The Bogers’ gift also meets a $1M donation challenge issued earlier this year by an anonymous donor to seed the Denella J. Clark Endowed Scholarship Fund, honoring the work of BAAF President and CEO Denella Clark.
The BAAF’s Building Our Future Campaign, which was publicly launched in spring 2019 and will officially close on June 30, supports faculty, programming, equipment, endowment, and scholarships at Boston Arts Academy (BAA), funding a cutting-edge Multimedia and Entertainment production CTE program, and equipping a state-of-the-art sound stage, recording studio, and theater.
“We are deeply humbled and grateful to Drs. Amy and Joshua Boger for their extraordinary $1 million gift,” Clark said. “Their generosity is not only helping us close a historic $35 million campaign—it’s also opening doors for generations of Boston Arts Academy students to pursue their dreams in the arts and beyond. This gift will have a profound and lasting impact on the lives of our young creatives, and we are honored to carry their legacy forward.”
The Bogers, artists themselves and passionate supporters of public school arts education, were honored by the BAAF in the Visual Arts category of the organization’s 2024 Honors event.
The new staff, scholarships, tutoring support, health and wellness programs, and new facilities funded by the campaign support a multidisciplinary curriculum and growing Career and Technical Education program at the school, located at 174 Ipswich St. in Boston. More than 4,500 donors have contributed support. Boston’s only public school dedicated to the arts, the BAA is a place of inspiration and artistic growth for talented children from every city neighborhood and all socio-economic backgrounds, and is notable for its unique funding structure and success rate—a public high school heavily reliant on philanthropy and the support of a foundation where nearly every student goes on to post-secondary education.
BAAF leaders and other stakeholders attending the June 27 luncheon will include President and CEO Denella Clark and board Chairman Jeff Rosica; Mayor Michelle Wu, honorary chairperson of the Building Our Future Campaign; Mark Lev, president and CEO of Boston Common Golf and co-chairman of the Building Our Future Campaign; and Dr. Joshua Boger, founder of Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated, author of more than 50 groundbreaking scientific publications and a noted amateur underwater photographer.
In addition to celebrating the BoF campaign, the BAAF looks forward to their signature upcoming “Honors” gathering. The signature event supports current and future BAA students with a $2.5M fundraising goal. BAA Honors recognizes leaders in the school’s art majors – Dance, Fashion Design and Technology, Music, Television and Film, and Visual Arts – as well as honorees in the Civic Responsibility and Lifetime Achievement categories. The 2025 Honors event will be held Thursday, Oct. 23, 2025, at the MGM Music Hall at Fenway in Boston.
About Drs. Amy and Joshua Boger
Dr. Amy Boger made a remarkable transition from pediatric medicine to the world of ceramic art. As the owner of Dirt and Light Arts LLC, she creates conceptual art that inhabits the border between sculptural and functional ceramics. Her work is known for its humor. She is a retired pediatrician and a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics. Dr. Boger holds a B.A. in American history and literature from Harvard University and an M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania.
Dr. Joshua Boger, the founder of Vertex Pharmaceuticals, retired as the company’s CEO in May 2009 and remains on its board. Dr. Joshua Boger joined Alkeus Pharmaceuticals as executive chairman in May 2012. Prior to founding Vertex in 1989, Boger worked for more than a decade in pharmaceutical research at Merck, where he developed an international reputation as a leader in the application of computer modeling to the chemistry of drug design and was a pioneer in the use of structure-based rational drug design as the basis for drug discovery
programs. He is the author of more than 50 scientific publications, holds 31 issued U.S. patents in pharmaceutical discovery and development, and has lectured widely in the United States, Europe, and Asia. A serious amateur photographer for almost 50 years, Dr. Joshua Boger began exploring the world of underwater photography in 2000, with a special emphasis on the reefs off Wakaya, a private island off the coast of Fiji. Since 2014 he has taken that hobby to the professional level, with six one-man gallery shows. A permanent exhibit of 22 of Boger’s photographs, titled “Wakaya Octocorals and Giants,” is on display in the lobby of the Exley Science Center.
About the Boston Arts Academy Foundation
Established in 1999, the Boston Arts Academy Foundation is an independent 501(c)(3) charitable nonprofit organization that raises essential funds from private philanthropic sources to augment the Boston Arts Academy school budget. The Boston Arts Academy Foundation helps bridge the gap between the school’s allocation from the Boston Public Schools and the true cost of a high-quality education that is both art-intensive and college-preparatory. The Boston Arts Academy Foundation raised more than $35 million through the six-year, comprehensive Building Our Future campaign, which began in 2017 to augment the BAA’s school budget and ensure long-term sustainability. The campaign includes raising $10 million to bring the Boston Arts Academy Foundation endowment to $13.5 million and securing $15.5 million in operating reserves. The endowment and reserves support what makes BAA unique, including expanded programming, the Health and Wellness Program, STEAM (STEM+Art), and funding for the arts. The endowment will support college scholarships for graduating seniors. The campaign supports Boston Arts Academy Foundation’s Annual Fund, which raises $6,000 per student each year. Building Our Future will ensure that as BAA’s student body grows, students can become successful artists, scholars, and citizens. https://bostonartsacademy.org/foundation.
About the Boston Arts Academy
Founded in 1998 as the city’s only public high school for the visual and performing arts, the Boston Arts Academy has distinguished itself among urban public high schools as a leader in innovative and effective student-centered education. Consistently recognized locally and nationally for its achievements, BAA exemplifies the power of an arts-rich education and many BAA graduates have found success in college through the arts. In fact, for the past ten straight years, at least 97 percent of BAA graduates have been accepted to college, with most being first-generation college attendees. BAA’s dynamic program prepares graduates to be critical thinkers, effective communicators, collaborators, and creators. Students come from all 20 Boston neighborhoods to receive the formal arts training and academic instruction that will
make them Boston’s next generation of artists and cultural leaders. In September 2022, the BAA community entered its new $125 million, 153,500 square foot facility. Among many highlights, it includes new and much-needed enhanced theaters, a career center, academic classrooms, dance studios, music practice rooms, art studios, and fashion technology studios and workspace. With the new school building, the number of students enrolled has increased to over 500. More information about the BAA is available on its Instagram and Facebook pages and its website at https://bostonartsacademy.org/.
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