King Randall, who founded The “X” for Boys program will be opening the New Life Preparatory School for Boys in Albany, Georgia at just 21-years old, reported WALB News 10.
Randall told WALB that he will be transforming an old school into a new one to provide more educational opportunities and learning experiences for young Black boys in Albany who might otherwise be drawn into juvenile delinquency and gang activities.
The school will offer traditional educational subjects like reading and math, but students will also learn trades like welding and auto repair. Other offerings will include firearms training and family sciences, as well as a number of clubs that foster and promote literacy.
“Doing different workshops teaching young men how to do different skill trades, we’re also doing a book club and teaching them how to read because 93 percent of the children I come into contact with can’t read. But now we have an 86 percent reading comprehension rate,” Randall told WALB.
Randall said he had dreams of opening a school such as this since he was just 19 – when he began The “X” For The Boys youth program. He knew there was a need because of the number of young people who sought him out wanting to join his program, so he decided to locate a facility large enough to build a school.
He was lucky to find an abandoned public school building when he asked the Dougherty County School System’s superintendent if they had a space they weren’t using.
“I gave the superintendent a call and asked if he had any school buildings they didn’t mind getting rid of and he was like, ‘Well, we have three buildings on the chopping block ready to be demolished,'” Randall said. “And I was like, ‘Oh really?’ So I went to go tour one of them and it is in great condition. Of course, it needs a little TLC but they just stopped using it maybe about two years ago.”
Randall is getting a groundswell of support from companies like Ford Motor Company, which has already donated 10,000 masks for future students of New Life Preparatory School.
