The STARR program was started in 1995 by Rutgers professors Daniel Hart and Robert Atkins, who was a school nurse at East Camden Middle School. The two hoped that they could foster the development of responsibility and resiliency in young teenagers through sports, community service, academic enrichment and the opportunity to form meaningful relationships with caring consistent adults.

The Camden STARR Program is a youth micro-program which means it is a volunteer organization with a small budget that seeks to promote youth development. (Click here to read more about starting your own micro-program). All of the adults who contribute to the STARR Program, which is a non-profit (501 c3), are volunteers and because the STARR Program has no paid staff or other overhead cost (e.g., building, vans, etc.) every dollar donated to the STARR Program goes directly to improving the life chances for children and youth growing up in Camden, NJ. In addition, none of the several hundred youth who have participated in the STARR Program over the past decade has ever paid to be a part of the program.

1. Activity. Adolescents are provided with year-round constructive activities. These activities include:
   • year-round recreational soccer
   • day and overnight trips such as canoeing in the Pine Barrens, backpacking in New England, and an annual summer camp experience in Vermont. These activities provide urban adolescents the opportunities for fun and constructive activity in a safe context (which recent national studies have noted are particularly lacking in poor cities).
     
2. Community Service. A growing body of evidence suggests that youth develop civic identity through participation in community service projects. Youth in the STARR program have participated in a variety of community service projects such as trash clean ups at local schools and parks, tree plantings with the NJ Tree Foundation, delivering turkey baskets to needy families for Thanksgiving, walking to raise money for lupus research, and sorting food at the South Jersey Food Bank. Through these mandatory activities, adolescents learn that they can contribute effectively to the welfare of their community.
   
3. Enduring Relationships. Youth can form enduring relationships with adults whom they see on a regular basis. Adults and youth in the STARR Program form relationships within the context of engaging in fun and constructive activities. Enduring relationships with caring, volunteer adults have been shown extremely effective in promoting healthy development in adolescents at risk.

By providing wholesome, fun activities and meaningful learning experiences, the STARR Program encourages and enables adolescents to choose a healthy path to a better future.