Original Article from The Times.
Simon Henderson is head of Britain’s most elite school. Mark Prince is the father of a teenage knife crime victim and is using boxing to turn young people away from gangs. They tell Nicola Woolcock about the tragedy that brought them together.
Simon Henderson and Mark Prince would appear to have little in common. One oversees the education of some of the country’s most wealthy and privileged boys at Eton, the school renowned for tailcoats, rowing and incubating prime ministers. The other, a bereaved father, runs a foundation from a boxing ring to lure troubled youngsters in a deprived inner city borough away from drugs, knife crime and gangs.
Prince, 55, who had already turned his life around after experiencing crime, homelessness and drug and alcohol addiction in his teens, suffered the worst possible blow in 2006. His son Kiyan, a prodigiously talented footballer, was stabbed to death outside his school while defending a friend who was being attacked.
Kiyan, 15, played for Queens Park Rangers’ youth team and was described as one of its “brightest talents”. After much anguish, his father set up the Kiyan Prince Foundation to try to steer teenagers away from trouble.
His talks at schools have been heard by almost 100,000 pupils to date, with his experiences hitting home where others have failed to connect. Many have also benefited from life coaching under the guise of intensive boxing training, which he uses to instil messages of discipline, control, self-esteem, trusting the right people and working hard for long-term success.
Henderson, 48, is a lifelong supporter of QPR, which has supported the foundation, and contacted Prince offering his help. Now he is the chairman of trustees for the charity and has a strategy for expansion.
IT IS ON PRINCE’S STAMPING GROUND IN TOTTENHAM, north London, that we meet to discuss their unlikely partnership. Henderson, the head of Eton, has swapped white tie for a plain white T-shirt and jeans. Prince, a former light-heavyweight champion, dapper in white trainers and with hands the size of Incredible Hulk gloves, holds out a couple of fingers for me to shake as he carries equipment into his boxing gym.
A three-legged greyhound sniffs the grass outside, overlooked by a 25ft mural of the footballer Ledley King. Banners advertising Balkan dancing lessons and car-boot sales are tied to the railings opposite a Turkish minimarket and a boarded-up fast-food restaurant. The Spurs stadium looms like an ocean liner.
It feels more than 30 miles from the postcard prettiness of Eton High Street.
But Prince’s teenage audiences have also included the privileged offspring of the country’s elite; he has twice spoken at Eton and secured the first standing ovation for an address in its chapel. Henderson says Prince’s “amazing authenticity” cut through, adding, “We have compulsory chapel on Sunday morning for 750 boys, for some perhaps not their favourite thing. Mark started speaking. Within a split second you could just see the boys thinking, ‘This is something different.’ ”
Prince preached to the boys. “I wanted the young guys to see that, regardless of their background, they might have some financial backing, parents in powerful positions, and they might seem to have an advantage in life.
“But you need to develop your minds to overcome the challenges that you have to face in your life, because everyone’s going to have to bury loved ones, people are going to get sick. Things happen. And you need resilience. You need to be able to make sacrifices. You need to be able to focus on your goals.
“We talked about those things on the back of my experiences. I was homeless but I had a dream to become a champion. The process that it took to get through that isn’t that much different from the process they’ve got to go through to focus on exams, set goals, whether it’s to be on Wall Street or run their own businesses.”
The main message was that they should care and contribute. “I think that was an important message for the Etonians: that they have a responsibility to contribute to their communities.”
“Do I go with my anger or do I allow what I’ve taught my son ― how to live with goodness ― to lead to forgiveness? I decided to do the right thing. There was no way I could be of any use to anybody carrying bitterness around with me.”
Forgiveness was like an internal boxing match. “It’s like drug addiction, depression. The negative thoughts always come back. The process is about how to keep practising the right thoughts. After a while, it became second nature. It probably took the better part of a few years.”
Hasan remains in prison for the murder, having been refused parole. Prince has sent messages back and forth but a meeting between them was blocked.
HENDERSON AND PRINCE “MET” INITIALLY ON LINKEDIN, then met up for a drink, where they hit it off instantly.
“It wasn’t about ‘what I could do for you’. It was, ‘Let me know if there’s anything I can do,” says Prince of Henderson. “Simon runs Eton College so he’s got to have some good business acumen. And I know that he knows people. He’s got to have a black book. I was pretty transparent.”
And for Henderson, was he worried this would be seen as patronising ― crumbs from the rich man’s table? He tries not to bristle. “It’s a human connection, wanting to support young people. And I want to get involved because I was inspired by Mark and I think it’s the right thing to do. He is a driving force and in a small way I thought I could help and support. It was a meeting of minds and a human connection.
“Our contexts are clearly pretty different. But our core values and beliefs about how you get young people to take individual responsibility and agency for their own lives comprise a similar message.”
Outside the gym, Prince is frequently stopped by teenagers and young adults who have heard him speak. Prince sees himself almost as a surrogate father to troubled youths, treating them as his own, thinking, how would I address this problem if they were my own child?
His paternal approach is all the more remarkable because his early life with a strongly disciplinarian father was an “absolute disaster”, he says, culminating in him dropping out of school and living on the streets self-medicating with drugs and alcohol and getting sucked into crime.
Becoming a parent was the “best thing that ever happened to me”. When asked about the process of grief, Prince’s voice falters but his composure does not slip.
“Yesterday morning, the cat woke me up. I tried to go back to sleep. I just had images from a dream of my son crying.” He pauses to steady his voice. “Kiyan was crying. He was asking the guy, ‘What did you do that for, man? Why did you do that?’ His best friend, Richard ― they were both trying to break up the fight ― shared with me that Kiyan didn’t cry. He was just a happy guy.
“So, I couldn’t get that out of my head when I woke up. It doesn’t go anywhere.”
Tears roll down his cheek. Henderson pats him on the leg and his wife keeps a watchful eye from a corner. “This is my life. I don’t escape from this.”
Of other parents who have lost children, he says, “I understand them. I recently saw the mum of the girl [Elianne Andam] who got stabbed in Croydon. Somehow we both understand each other. There’s a language though nothing’s been said.”
HENDERSON SEES HIS ROLE AS A TRUSTEE as liberating Prince. “If we’re going to continue to grow the charity and have an impact on more young people, then it needs not to be entirely dependent on Mark. It needs to have a structure so we can free him up to do the things he’s brilliant at and other people can take care of other stuff that you need to do in the modern world to run a successful charity.”
Eton College is also a charity, albeit on a different scale with an income of £100 million in 2022, including donations of £8 million. The Kiyan Prince Foundation had an income of £66,000 in 2023.
“Like most grassroots charities, we need to raise more money and fundraising is a constant Challenge,” Henderson says.
It already runs football matches and boxing events, including one called Jabbing Not Stabbing, and arranges talks in schools in London and Slough.
Henderson wants the charity to develop in three directions: more school visits by motivational speakers; a 12-week personal development programme for those at risk; and a new research arm, tapping into the often unheard views of young people from the margins.
Its first piece of research, published today, is sobering reading: young people feel less safe than two years ago and are crying out for places to socialise or play sport. Some describe wanting youth clubs without knowing that such a thing ever existed in the past.
“They want structured, organised activity, particularly sport. And sadly that has been reduced significantly,” says Henderson. “Since 2010, these services have been cut by about 70 per cent:
4,500 youth jobs have gone since 2010 and 750 youth centres have been closed.”
Prince says the biggest gap in facilities comes at secondary age, “a time where we should be depositing as much knowledge and support as we can. It’s tough for many kids who want to do sports, but their parents aren’t in that financial position.”
The pair chat in front of a boxing ring in the venue where Prince, known locally by his surname, cut his teeth in 1991, pitted in his first session against one of the professionals who came to the venue looking for sparring partners. Blue walls are adorned with a mural of boxing greats and photos of local youngsters. The whirr of a skipping rope is the background to our conversation.
“The only thing that’s changed is the broken-down ring, now replaced. But this is the same place I walked into: sweat, hard work, guys shouting, going through painful exercises. This is where I’m at.
“And that’s why I know young people need people that believe in them, positive people that have experienced adversity to draw them away from those driving a car and flashing money at them. Let’s give them some substance, teach them the blueprint for success. We judge them a lot quicker than trying to understand them.”
One of Prince’s biggest annoyances is the “demographic narrative” that only certain parts of society get caught up in gangs. One boy he has helped escape the clutches of drug dealers is too embarrassed to invite friends round because he lives in a nice house in St Albans.
Several girls also attend the coaching sessions. “Everyone’s got something they’re frustrated about, that they want to get out of their system. You don’t have to go as far as getting hit. It’s a fun way of keeping yourself in good condition.
“The boxing platform gives me an opportunity not just to train them physically but mentally. I want young people to go through life with some of the knowledge I didn’t have, taking control of their anger issues.
“For two hours, I get to be here and talk to them about what’s going on in their lives and push them while they’re going through this process.
All the characteristics that you need to develop as a champion in boxing, you need those as
a person outside the ring: patience, discipline, not losing your temper, self-control and self-esteem are really important.”
Teenagers are encouraged to compare the longer-term outcomes of young people from the boxing gym with those from gangs, who may end up dead or in jail. “Gangs groom you to get you involved because they make you feel like you’re part of them and you belong to something. So you get kids coming here who want to belong. It offers this platform for them to be able to say, ‘I don’t need to do things on the streets. I’ve got a home to come to. People care about me.’ ”
What are his ultimate goals? “I want opportunities for young people to get scholarships. Maybe one day to Eton. What a story that would be.”
