WATCH: An after-school drop-in youth empowerment centre founded by retired Canadian champion boxer Charles Spider Jones is helping at-risk youth in the Jane Street/Finch Avenue area stay on the right path. Susan Hay has the story.
TORONTO – Former boxer Spider Jones founded Spider’s Web Youth Empowerment Centre, which helps to engage youth in both school and many other activities. And he has quite a story to tell.
“I’m an ex-con. I did a lot of time in prison as a young man,” said Jones. “And one of the things that I did, and I take full responsibility for it, but I hung around with people that were always getting into trouble.”
Jones has gone on to do some great things in his life, but his dream was always to create a place where at-risk youth could be empowered. His dream came true nearly four years ago, when he founded Spider’s Web Youth Empowerment Centre.
“What we really work on here is developing their self-worth, developing their self-esteem,” said Jones.
The after-school drop-in centre, located in the Jane Street and Finch Avenue area, is open six days a week, and sees more than 50 youth each night.
“These kids have so much passion in them, so much talent in them,” said Kwame Agyemang, director of Spider’s Web Youth Empowerment Centre. “Just take the time to get to know them, give them the resources, and you’d be surprised what comes out.”
“Kwame…teaches me how to read,” said Shaquana Adams, a ten-year-old participant at the centre. “My grades are going higher, and my reading skills are going higher, too.”
The centre provides free meals, homework help, computer rooms, and a number of other programs. There are also boxing classes, which spider feels is another way to build confidence.
“Boxing is just another metaphor for life. You get knocked down, you get back up into the fight,” said Jones. “This is an area where kids aren’t born with a silver spoon in their mouth. They have to struggle for everything. And we see change when they come in here because they begin to believe in themselves.”
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