Inside a 12,000-square-foot church building at 47th and Chestnut in West Philadelphia, hundreds of teenagers line up most weeks for free meals, tutoring, a computer lab, and a few hours away from the dangers waiting outside. The nonprofit behind it, Level Up Philly, previously received about 1,400 visitors per week, and weekly attendance had risen to about 3,000 early in 2025. Its founder insists the doors stay open no matter how crowded it gets.
From a Handful of Kids to Thousands a Week
Level Up began as a monthly gathering between a handful of students, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer. It has since grown into a sprawling operation that, per founder Aaron Campbell, has seen attendance more than double in the past year. The nonprofit's own site describes it as a program offering after-school tutoring, homework help, meals, and a safe place for young people, and Level Up Philly identifies Campbell as its founder and executive director as well as lead pastor of Antioch Christian Fellowship, the congregation that holds weekly services in the same building.
Reported attendance figures vary depending on the source and date. The Inquirer's reporting says Level Up previously received roughly 1,400 visitors per week, with weekly attendance reaching about 3,000 visitors early in 2025 and the program averaging roughly 1,000 visitors on each day it was open that year. Separately, a 2024 Inquirer report put typical school-year attendance at 1,000 to 1,200 children per week from 140 schools, while state lawmakers at Senators Hughes and Street's office cited about 1,000 students from 151 schools attending Monday through Wednesday, and Campbell himself told GovTech the program serves about 2,500 students from more than 141 schools weekly. Whatever the precise count, Level Up's visitors represent more than 150 schools and come from nearly every neighborhood in the city, according to the Inquirer.
Fish Tacos, 3-D Printers and Robotic Dogs
The program's offerings have expanded along with its crowds. Level Up provides free meals, a computer lab, dance battles, a music studio, and other services, the Inquirer reports, with fresh meals including fish tacos among what's served. A separate account from WHYY describes technology programming that includes 3-D printers, virtual-reality headsets, and two robotic dogs, serving young people ages 10 to 25 with after-school programming, tutoring, a safe space, and cash incentives for good grades. The nonprofit also rewards young people with promising report cards with cash, the Inquirer notes.
The growth hasn't come cheap. Level Up has increased spending to accommodate more security and food preparation, per the Inquirer's reporting, and now has roughly 30 staff members. Food preparation moved off-site after the building's kitchen proved too small to keep up with demand. Romaine Branham, described as a Level Up volunteer, began helping with food preparation after Campbell asked his Antioch congregation for assistance.
Security at the Door, a Tattoo on His Arm
Safety is woven into daily operations. Valdez Johnson, Level Up's head of security, oversees a staff that searches each visitor for weapons upon entering the building — a practice serious enough that Philadelphia Police Department officers have visited Level Up to observe how it manages large groups of young people. Johnson, for his part, keeps things lighter in smaller moments, telling the Inquirer, “We celebrate mustaches here.”
The stakes behind that security are personal for Campbell. A tattoo on his forearm memorializes seven Level Up young people who were killed, according to the Inquirer. One of them, Talik Bridges, was 18 when he was shot and killed while walking to catch a bus in Olney on December 24, 2024. Campbell, who is 52 and has three adult children, told the paper that the period surrounding those losses was “the most stressful year of my life.”
Funding Grows Alongside the Need
Public money has followed the nonprofit's rising profile. The city awarded Level Up a $650,000 Community Expansion Grant at the end of 2023 to build and fund a STEM lab through the end of 2024, according to the Inquirer's earlier reporting. More recently, Level Up received $500,000 in new state funding from the Pennsylvania Department of Education, presented by Senators Hughes and Street on September 8. Level Up Philly was launched in 2019, per that announcement, though a separate account from the Philadelphia Citizen has put the founding year at 2018 — a discrepancy the available records don't resolve. An affiliated program using the same model and branding is set to begin in New York City's Harlem neighborhood, the Inquirer reports.
The demand Level Up is absorbing reflects a city-level reality. Philadelphia has the highest poverty rate among age brackets for people under 18, at 27.1%, according to the Inquirer's reporting. Campbell has framed his approach to that need bluntly: “I would never turn away a hungry child.”
Stories Behind the Numbers
Among the young people passing through Level Up's doors is James Smith, 18, who joined the program's newer wave of visitors a couple of years ago and dreamed of becoming a carpenter. Campbell helped him enter a youth trades program with Catholic Charities of Philadelphia, through which Smith is set to receive paid after-school training, certifications, and a set of tools by the time he graduates high school in spring 2027.
Kimora Gabriel, 16, from Nicetown, began attending Level Up about a year before publication. She is in foster care and co-parenting with her daughter's father after giving birth in August 2026; Level Up provided her nourishing meals during the pregnancy and diapers afterward, and Campbell arranged Uber rides home for her. “It's draining, but I'm working through it,” Gabriel told the Inquirer. Fifteen-year-old Ian Garner developed an original board game teaching players about solving world hunger, which he says will go on sale soon, while 21-year-old Robert Watford is also among those who've found a place in the program, according to the paper's reporting.
A Citywide Backdrop of Falling, But Uneven, Risk
Level Up's expansion comes as Philadelphia's youth gun-violence numbers tell a mixed story. During the 2025-2026 school year, 230 school-aged youth were shot citywide, including 78 active School District of Philadelphia students, according to Chalkbeat. The number of shootings of active students has decreased annually since 2022, and gun-violence victimization among active students has fallen 70% since the 2021-2022 school year, Chalkbeat reports. But risk remains uneven: cyber charter students were shot at a rate of 0.81 per 1,000 that year, more than double the roughly 0.30 per 1,000 rate for traditional and non-cyber charter students, and students at alternative schools faced a rate of 3.79 per 1,000. More than half of student shootings occurred in just five ZIP codes, including 19139 in West Philadelphia, where Level Up is based.
Other data points to a harder edge beneath the overall decline. The number of Philadelphia juveniles charged with homicide rose from three in 2016 to 26 in 2024, according to The Trace, which also notes that gun crimes committed by juveniles rose 24% nationally between 2019 and 2022. Level Up isn't alone in responding to that landscape — nearby groups like YEAHPhilly and the Anti-Violence Partnership of Philadelphia also serve West Philadelphia youth touched by violence — but for the teenagers and young adults packing into Campbell's building three days a week, it has become a fixture they keep returning to.
