The Boys and Girls Clubs of Northeast Florida and Project SOS celebrated their merger and the retirement of long time founder and CEO of Project SOS, Pam Mullarkey Robbins, on Aug. 5 with a barbecue at Board Member Paul Price's home in Palm Valley.
The two organizations merged on July 1. Project SOS will now be under the direction of the Boys and Girls Clubs at their headquarters.
Mullarkey founded Project SOS 20 years ago when she felt compelled to help teenagers with goal setting, boundaries, bullying, avoiding drugs/alcohol and more. Through her organization, Mullarkey also helped teens in North Florida and Southeast Georgia deal with violence and suicide. According to Project SOS, the organization has impacted the lives of over 470,000 teenagers since 1993 by presenting critical life skills in middle schools and high schools during the school day.
The Boys & Girls Clubs of Northeast Florida and Project SOS complement one another in mission and operations to serve youth and teens. BGCNF serves nearly 5,000 youth in after-school programs, and Project SOS serves over 10,000 youth annually through in-school programs.
There are currently 25 Boys and Girls Club sites throughout Northeast Florida, and plans are in the works to eventually have two state of the art teen centers, one in Springfield and one in Arlington. These centers will provide teenagers quality programming, a variety of activities and entrepreneurial skills to meet their needs and give them something productive to do after school.
