The University of Maryland, Baltimore Police Athletic/Activities League (UMBPAL) is a mentoring program for second- through eighth-grade students from West Baltimore.

It is a partnership between the University of Maryland, Baltimore’s Police Department and the Office of Community Engagement’s Community Engagement Center. The program works to nurture relationships between police officers and neighborhood children through weekly meetings, field trips, and activities. 

• Weekly activities include reading enrichment, science experiments, martial arts, career exploration, community service, and visual arts.
• Monthly field trips include visits to cultural museums, historic sites, and theaters. 
• Through a partnership with the School of Nursing and the Black Cherry Puppet Theater, the children help create, produce, and perform an original puppet show. 
• The children learn about what it takes to become a police officer and how to identify good policing techniques.
• This is the only official National PAL Chapter in Maryland located on a college campus, which makes UMBPAL unique in that it is located within a public urban university devoted to improving the human condition through the professions of dentistry, law, nursing, medicine, pharmacy, and social work. 
• Mentors receive training in trauma-informed care, mentoring best practices, and restorative practices.