‘Keep your doors open' — Joy, pride and life lessons as 100 Black boys graduate from summer program

Hamilton Spectator

2 days ago

When Jared Hendly's mom told the 12-year-old that he'd be going to a summer camp for four weeks, he thought it would be like any other camp.
But the past month at 100
Strong Academy, a summer program for middle-school-aged Black boys around the GTA aimed at inspiring them about higher education and future careers, were anything but that.
He went to an auto shop to learn how people fix cars, he got to meet finance executives from firms in Toronto and he saw a new view of the CN Tower, from the top of a skyscraper downtown.
While Hendly still has middle and high school to finish, he already has some ideas of what he wants to do when he grow up — become an engineer, a lawyer or maybe even play for the Leafs — paths he said he didn't think were possible before going through the Strong Academy program.
Asked what he learned the last four weeks, he replied: 'Always keep your doors open.' (He also said if he had to rate his experience on a scale from one to 10, he'd give it a 12.)
Hendly was one of 100 boys to cross the stage at a graduation ceremony to celebrate the end of the 2025 program year at the auditorium of University of Toronto Schools in downtown Toronto on Thursday evening.
The crowd of parents and family members — their phone cameras pointed to the stage — erupted as Hendly and each of the other boys walked up to the stage in their matching white polo shirts to pick up their plaques.
The ceremony capped off the four-week program in which every July, a group of Black boys ages 11 to 14 participate in activities related to STEM, the arts and entrepreneurship at one of the three University of Toronto campuses. The boys also go on a week-long camping trip and visits to other places around Toronto, with one of this year's trips being to Sony Music's office.
Jared Hendly walks across the stage at the graduation ceremony, shaking the hands of his teachers and academy leaders. Asked what he learned the last four weeks, he replied: 'Always keep your doors open.'
'This wasn't just a camp,' said this year's valedictorian, Brennan-Jay Bennett, a 12-year-old from Peel region. 'It was a space to form friendships with people and to grow.
'I started to believe in myself more,' he continued. 'I was growing more confident in myself and what I can achieve.'
This is the point of Strong Academy, according to Judge Donald McLeod, the program's co-founder.
Inspired by his own experience at a similar program through Toronto Metropolitan University (then known as Ryerson) when he was younger, McLeod and co-founder Ainsworth Morgan, an acting superintendent at the TDSB, created the program to empower Black boys as they face educational and psychological challenges. He pointed specifically to statistics showing Black boys with high rates of dropping out of high school, incarceration and being victims of crime.
In March, the
head of the Ontario Human Rights Commission
said that 'racism and discrimination in education' has been affecting Black children and youth for decades. Other investigations have revealed that Black people, particularly men and teens, have been subject to street checks by police at higher rates than white people by various police forces in Canada.
'It was really a program to address and disrupt what we felt was very much a problem in the Black community,' McLeod said, 'and we felt that education was very much the way to be able to streamline them out of these disproportionate adverse numbers.'
These statistics also shaped the decision to tailor the program to boys in middle school.
'It's a chance to get to them when they're impressionable,' McLeod said.
Over 1,000 boys have gone through the program since 2013 when McLeod and Morgan launched it, only accepting 25 boys in the first year. All of the participants are recommended by their teachers and respective schools.
McLeod said he enjoys watching the boys go through a 'transformational' experience every summer. He noted how many of the boys at the end of the program have a new interest in finishing high school and getting a university degree.
'The way they look at you, the way they shake your hands, the way that they conduct themselves,' he said, 'you can see that the boys have actually changed.'
'I started to believe in myself more,' said valedictorian Brennan-Jay Bennett, 12.
A big reason for this is the program's emphasis on showing them future careers or paths they might not have been aware of before, according to McLeod.
Whether it's bringing in Black people employed at Fortune 500 companies, talking to a judge one on one after watching part of a trial or even just being on a university campus being led by older, Black male mentors, McLeod said the program follows the adage 'if you see it, you can be it.'
For 14-year-old Myles Bedeau he realized that he wants to become an engineer who builds airplanes after a visit to Air Canada's Toronto offices.
'I'd recommend it to a lot of people, especially if they don't know what they want to be in the future,' Bedeau said.
Looking back over the past 12 years, McLeod is proud of the impact Strong Academy has had.
'One of our ideas was awakening greatness in every boy, and I think we've been able to do that.'