About Us

I had a challenging childhood in a difficult part of London, being a young black man, dyslexic and not diagnosed until going to university. As a youth I was expelled from school and went to a pupil referral unit. I drifted into crime that led to being sentenced to a 6-year custodial sentence for knifepoint street robbery after being given every possible non-custodial sentence available for a juvenile. At 17 I went on an intensive residential programme that was run by highly skilled professionals and facilitated largely by volunteers from the local community, where I had a mentor as part of a follow through programme. This gave me belief in myself, as well as finding someone who could see my potential, which was truly invaluable. I found my passion in working with young people and I then went to university, getting a BA in Criminology and worked for 12 years as a manager of a Behaviour Support Unit within a secondary school, managing a team of people and supporting hundreds of young people. I have now worked with well over a thousand young people in a variety of settings including street corners, schools, children's homes, youth centres, and prisons. I received a Jack Petchey award in 2017 for outstanding service to young people and have developed my own successful mentoring project and have continued to work in different settings with young people from asylum seekers to care leavers, gang members to those exploited by others.