Step inside Olivet Boys & Girls Club and you’ll find something magical: young people learning, exploring and connecting with caring adults. Kids completing their homework. Teens researching colleges or planning a community service project. Club members running, jumping, laughing, playing games and improving their health at the same time.

The Boys & Girls Club experience is a powerful thing. Just ask Ed Brown, Club alum and 2004 Olivet Boys & Girls Club Youth of the Year who recently finished his Masters degree in Counseling at West Chester University. Ed attributes much of his success to the things he learned at the Club. Or ask Elton George of the Atlanta area who said on Facebook that the Club “kept me and my friends out of trouble growing up. It (the Club) was like a second home.” “Second home” is a term you’ll hear from many of the thousands of kids, ages six through 18, who come to Olivet Boys & Girls Club as well as hundreds of Club alumni.

Step outside the Club and the view may not be so rosy. More than a quarter of American youth do not graduate from high school. Nearly a third are overweight or obese. More than 20 percent live in poverty.

Since 1898, Olivet Boys & Girls Club has been serving the youth of Greater Reading. We reach out to some of the area’s hardest to reach young people. We provide them with a safe, positive, fun environment, supportive relationships, opportunities and expectations, and recognition.

Through the Club experience, Olivet Boys & Girls Club has the power to affect the young people who need us most by helping them to graduate from high school ready for college, trade school, military or employment; be engaged citizens of good character who are involved in the community; and who adopt a healthy diet and practice healthy lifestyle choices. These are the outcomes for which we strive.

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