Resources: Review - One man's view of how to solve challengingbehaviour

From Latchkey to Leadership By Kathy Gyngell and Ray Lewis Published by the Centre for Policy Studies 2006 Price 7.50 32 pages ISBN 1 905389 29 9

I wasn't aware that think-tanks could be such explicit mechanisms for marketing the ideas of one man. But this pamphlet is essentially a promotional tool for Ray Lewis' Eastside Young Leaders' Academy and an advertisement for others to join a franchise.

Lewis was a kid from the wrong side of the tracks who came good - largely through contact with one teacher. He trained for the clergy, worked abroad, then became a governor of a young offenders' institution. Then came the Damascus moment - seeing the director of a young leaders' academy in the US on The Oprah Winfrey Show - that led him to establish a similar project in the London Borough of Newham. Focused exclusively on Black young men, it claims a phenomenal success rate with people who otherwise, it is asserted, would be on the fast track to drug dependency and custody.