BOSTON, Mass. -- Boston Police Officer Skye Robinson says she was mostly outnumbered when she began playing basketball at age 10 or 11.

"You had to play with the boys, and that was that," said Robinson, 35, a member of the school police unit. "All we did was play boys."

But Thursday at the Dr. Loesch Family Park in Dorchester, it was the boys who were outnumbered as about 50 girls practiced basketball skills during a daylong camp organized by a program of the Boston nonprofit Shooting Touch and a group of female officers.

"I was able to use basketball to break a lot of barriers, especially when I began my police career," said Robinson, a 10-year veteran. "It teaches you how to work well with others, showing you can work well with others. You got to have that team spirit."

The event was the warmup for a free program being launched in October in which girls living in the city will get to play basketball and learn life lessons through a partnership between G3: Getting Girls in the Game, and Women in Blue, a group of female Boston police officers who do volunteer work.

Police Deputy Superintendent Nora Baston, who organizes Women in Blue, said the group decided to collaborate with G3 after some members participated in a basketball camp the organization held in June.

Read Laura Crimaldi's full story here