Eastside Young Leaders’ Academy

The Eastside Young Leaders’ Academy is based in Newham, London and was formed by Ray Lewis in 2002. Ray is a former governor of a Young Offenders Institution who detected a causal link between academic underachievement and criminal activity amongst young black males, who are six times more likely to be excluded from school than their white counterparts. Ray used his life savings to set up EYLA which aims to ‘nurture the leadership potential of young African and Caribbean males, empowering them to become the next generation of successful leaders’.

EYLA works with disruptive black boys from the age of 8 who have been excluded from school or are on the verge of exclusion. In their work with the young boys, EYLA operates with the belief that the most disruptive pupils often have innate leadership ability. Their faith in this idea has been justified by a recent research report on the work of EYLA, which said that the most impressive individuals who attended the Academy had entered it as the most troublesome figures.

There are several core elements to the EYLA programme:

-Tutorial Programme: 2 hour after-school sessions to raise academic performance

-Saturday Academy: to develop the social and leadership skills of the boys

-Holiday Programme: activities to broaden horizons, 5 days a week in school holidays

-Community Service: 3-4 hours volunteering each month for the elderly, other charities etc

-Mentoring Plus: mentoring from inspirational role models, visits to and from businesses

-Family Support Network: monthly parental classes focussed on supporting the boys

On average, boys will spend twenty hours a week at the Academy. In all aspects of the programme, EYLA’s emphasis on early intervention, respect and self-worth are inculcating a culture of hard work, academic excellence and community involvement amongst the boys. This is supplemented by essential and appropriate parental support.

The programme has resulted in vastly increased attendance at school, improved academic results and greater civic involvement from the young leaders, who completed over 4000 hours of community service in the last year. EYLA achieves its fantastic results by building the academic and interpersonal skills of its boys, instilling in them a self-confidence that has been lacking and unlocking a creativity that is often hidden. Visits to corporations and places of cultural interest build the soft skills and cultural capital of the young leaders, who have never accessed such worlds before. The transformation in the boys is so startling that visitors frequently find it hard to believe the boys could possibly have behaved the way their initial referral form suggests. All of this is done at a fraction of the cost that is required to keep a child excluded from school.

EYLA’s core aim is to have all of its boys complete two A-levels and then have at least three quarters of them make successful applications to university. Indeed, a focus of EYLA’s work is to put the boys in as strong a position as possible for making university applications as, at present, there are two black males in prison for every one at university. While none of the boys are yet old enough to make applications, visits to universities such as Oxford and Cambridge are a key aspect of EYLA’s extra-curricular programme and are having a huge impact on the attitude and aspirations of boys, most recently shown in the award to two young leaders of full scholarships to Rugby school. EYLA’s success has resulted in strong interest in replicating the model across several other areas of the country.

For more information, please visit their website http://www.eyla.org.uk/.

To contact EYLA, please call 020 8522 1000.