Former gang members spent the morning with at-risk kids in Toronto sharing their experiences in an effort to prevent them from taking the same path.
Chad Briand, the director of the Turk Foundation, was at Riverdale Park on Saturday to have a frank discussion about guns and gangs.
“I’ve been to the streets, I’ve been to jail, I’ve been through a lot of the negative parts of life, so we are trying to show them not to do what we’ve been through,” Briand said.
“If more of these programs were in place, these kids wouldn’t have time to be picking up guns or selling drugs. They’d actually have people to talk to them and support them.”
Fourteen-year-old Ben Jackson, who attended the event, said the foundation’s message was more powerful than any discussions he may have received from his parents.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about, how can you tell me how it is if you don’t know? But hearing it from everyone who’s already been through it has changed my input.”
Along with face painting and a bouncy castle, the Turk Foundation also put on a boxing camp bringing in two-time Canadian National Boxing Champion Triston Brookes to teach the kids new skills.
“They’re learning boxing, learning how to be disciplined, learning to push each other, and make new friends, family, everything,” Brookes said.
The boxing camp will continue on Sunday at Riverdale Park East from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Participants will receive a new pair of shoes along with a backpack full of supplies to make sure they’re ready for the first day of school.
