Late last year, we opened a brand new office in the heart of Warwick, Rhode Island, bringing our team closer to the children, families, schools, and partners we serve every day. After more than 35 years in New England, this move allows us to be more accessible, more responsive, and even more embedded in the community.
From supporting families in their homes, to working directly in classrooms, to partnering with child welfare and foster care systems, our work is all about wrapping around kids where they are and Warwick puts us right at the center of that mission.
We’re proud to be boots on the ground in this incredible community and excited to continue building strong connections across the region.
"Boys Town New England, a branch of a national organization more than 100 years old, has found a new office location in Warwick on Metro Center Boulevard.
The child-welfare nonprofit recently moved from offices in Providence to Warwick, which Interim Executive Director Marcy Shyllon says is a more central location that allows staff to better serve those in need.
After being in New England for 35 years, Boys Town found through extensive research that most children and families they serve are within a 15-to-20-minute drive from Warwick.
“We identified that zip code as being the most beneficial location to house our employees so that they could serve the highest population of kids and families,” said Shyllon. “We partner a lot with DCYF (the state Department of Children, Youth & Families), and we’ve come to find that DCYF also does a lot of business in Warwick.”
Boys Town NE will serve any child or family in Rhode Island, and in Massachusetts if a staff member can reach them within an hour of the Warwick, Portsmouth or Foxboro, Massachusetts offices.
“We’re all doing the same thing; we’re wrapping around children in their community, in their homes and in their schools. We’re trying to make sure that they are taken care of in the best way possible,” said Shyllon.
Using a spectrum of data-driven programs, Boys Town NE works with any child, or any adultconnected to a child, who is facing behavioral or physical problems.
“First and foremost, we try to be preventative,” said Shyllon. “We try to keep kids home with their families, if at all possible.”
If they can’t keep the child in their home, Boys Town will try to find the next best and safest place for that child and support them in that environment so that they have the chance to thrive. Foster care is one program for children who can’t stay in their home.
“Something we’ve been doing even more recently is working in schools to support teachers who are struggling with kids’ behaviors and academic success,” said Shyllon, explaining that her staff have started working directly with teachers in their classrooms. “We are boots on the ground.”
Boys Town can send school support specialists to work in the school if teachers are struggling to regulate a child’s behavior within the classroom. The specialist can remove the child from the classroom and work with them separately during the school day until they reach a point where they can be reintroduced to the classroom. Also, if needed, services can be extended to the child’s home, which often helps to address the root of the issue.
“We’ll train the parents, we’ll offer the school support specialist … and then we will also open up services in the home of the student if that need is identified. We’ll wrap around in all of those different capacities to try to help that student succeed,” she added.
Boys Town NE does not have contracts with Warwick Public Schools, although they do serve children in Warwick. Shyllon said that she, along with board member and Ward 6 Councilman Bill Muto, is hopeful there is potential for a school-based program in the future.
“Boys Town’s work resonates deeply with me because it embodies the kind of Warwick we’re striving to build – a community where every child is safe, supported, and empowered to thrive,” Muto wrote in an email to the Beacon. “I’ve seen how a family under stress can stabilize when someone steps in with guidance rather than judgment. This is the kind of care that changes lives, and I’m grateful Warwick will have it.”
Shyllon is celebrating her 20th year with Boys Town. She began her career with Boys Town in Philadelphia, where she was born and raised, but has been in New England for 18 years. Shyllonrose to the position of interim executive director when the opportunity presented itself late in 2025.
“The work we do here at Boys Town looks at every child on every level of the continuum,” said Shyllon. “Boys Town doesn’t really care how minimal or how extreme of intervention the child needs. We just want to intervene, because nine times out of ten, it’s not that child’s fault.”
Over the past 35 years, Boys Town NE has fluctuated both in the number of employees they have and the number of individuals they serve. Shyllon said while the number of employees has ebbed and flowed between as little as 20 staff to as many as 125, the organization is able to reach thousands of children in a given year.
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