Each year, Caldwell Partners International chooses 40 Canadians who were under 40 in the past year to honour for their outstanding achievements. Click here to learn more about the program, and find more winners in the list below.
Shunted between abusive relatives after his father was laid off and unable to support eight children, Frederick Dryden found himself running with the rougher crowd at a young age.
It wasn't until the Jamaican-born young man “connected with the church” in Hamilton that he found a sense of purpose, eventually becoming a financial planner.
As his church involvement grew, he joined their prison-visitation program and realized he could use his difficult youth as a beacon of hope.
“With the support of my wife, I walked away from my job,” he said.
It was 2003, and Mr. Dryden had two young children to support when he and a small group of supporters formed Liberty for Youth, a program to reach out to troubled teens in Hamilton.
He sold chocolates and took out a line of credit to keep his charity afloat. When he realized the youth needed constant support to stay clean, he renovated his own basement and took a few of them into his home.
“My resources were drained ... but I just kept going on and on,” he said.
In 2006, the Department of Justice Canada provided Liberty for Youth's first grant: a $96,000 boon.
“That project – we helped 165 youth who are at risk and for that, I won a national Me to We award. So that created exposure.”
And from there, corporate and volunteer support followed. Liberty for Youth has served nearly 200 youth leaving prison, with an 87-per-cent high-school-graduation rate, and currently is on its second pilot project with the department.
The organization has also provided $35,000 in post-secondary scholarships to youth who have not re-offended.
“This project has brought a lot of credibility and half a million dollars over three years, and has allowed me to have four staff,” Mr. Dryden said.
“The only problem with that is it’s a three-year project and then it comes to an end in 2012 – how do I sustain it?”
He's still working on the answer, but says he hopes the community will pitch in.
“It's a constant battle to work two jobs – one is that I work in this field and help youth, and the other is I have to fundraise. If there are no funds, I have to stop helping kids and look for money. I hope that doesn't happen.”
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