The Good Guides logo The Good GuidesInner City Youth Mentoring
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Putting the Keys in Young People's Hands

Youth-led mentoring for inner-city youth in Scarborough, Toronto.

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Good Guide Ambassadors in gloves serving food under a canopy at a community barbecue
2020
Founded
10,000+
Youth Mentored Since 2020
Our Philosophy

The keys are in their hands

Young people already run the culture. Nobody handed them the music, the businesses, the fashion, or the art — they built all of it themselves. The work in their own neighbourhoods should be theirs to run, too.

There's a difference between a seat at the table and the keys to the house. A seat means young people are invited in — heard, on someone else's terms. The Good Guides was built to hand over the whole house: young people lead the work, set the direction, and make the decisions, with mentors from their own neighbourhoods behind them — no guests, no passengers.

Along the way, they pick up skills that stay with them long after any single program ends.

Children gathered around a superhero inflatable at an outdoor school carnival
Students celebrating at the Community Graduation 2K21
Our Organisation

Make a difference in your community

Our volunteers mentor youth after school and back the work young people create and run themselves. Whatever time you have, there is a way to help.

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What We Do

Mentoring

After-school mentoring for ages 11–18, built on mentors who come back week in and week out.

Violence prevention

Workshops on preventing violence and settling conflict, delivered in the neighbourhoods our youth call home — backed by a City of Toronto grant since 2023.

Co-op & leadership

Co-op students join as Good Guide Ambassadors and build events of their own — practical sessions and community days, planned and run by the students themselves.

For youth & parents: young people ages 11–18 join through their school cohort. Families can ask their school about joining.

How to join

Programs at a glance: after-school mentoring and co-op placements for ages 11–18, in the neighbourhoods our young people call home.

See our programs
To change the starting line for young people — not just cheer them on from it.
— Swabir Shariff · Founder & Executive Director

The latest from The Good Guides

October 2026

Founder honoured in London

Swabir Shariff was named one of the QECT 100 Young Leaders for 2026. He received the award at Asprey in London and attended a reception at St James's Palace.

 2023

Youth Violence Prevention Grant

The City of Toronto awarded The Good Guides its Youth Violence Prevention Grant in 2023.
About

Built in Scarborough. Led by the youth it serves.

The Good Guides is a grassroots, Black-led non-profit in Scarborough. Here, inner-city youth run the programs and events in their own neighbourhoods — with experienced mentors behind them.

See our programs Take Action
Swabir Shariff kneeling with a child in front of a crowd of youth, families and neighbours at an ice-cream truck, Share-a-Meal bags in hand, at a Good Guides community event in Scarborough
Where It Started

Built by the community, because the community had to

The Good Guides began in Scarborough in 2020, and has mentored more than 10,000 young people here since. The idea started with Swabir Shariff, who grew up in Toronto Community Housing there — and friends who grew up alongside him were part of it from the start. Together they had watched the services meant to help young people miss them entirely.

It wasn't a lack of money or good intentions. The workers came from somewhere else. The programs were designed somewhere else. Kids couldn't see themselves in any of it — nobody in the room knew their streets, their schools, or their lives, so nobody in the room was trusted.

So they built their own: mentors from those same neighbourhoods, people young people could recognise as their own. It still runs the way it grew — mentors showing up week after week, and young people stepping up to lead alongside them.

Good Guides youth and a partner staff member packing meal boxes and bottled water for a community distribution
Children carrying new backpacks across the grass at a Back to School event in Scarborough
Why We Exist

Our vision & mission

Our Vision

A generation of young people in Scarborough who lead in their own neighbourhoods — building skills, running programs, and making their streets stronger, with mentors behind them.

Our Mission

We mentor youth in Scarborough and work with their families, week after week, as young people grow into leaders — through after-school mentoring, violence-prevention workshops, and co-op placements where Ambassadors learn to lead.

What We Stand For

Our core values

Inclusivity

Every young person belongs here.

Respect

A caring space where young people are treated with respect — and expected to show it: to themselves, to others, and to their community.

Empowerment

Mentoring that puts youth and their families in charge of the decisions that shape their lives.

Creativity

Communities keep changing, so we keep adjusting — trying new ideas and keeping what works.

Volunteers serving food to youth at an outdoor barbecue beside a grill
Good Guides mentors and community members gathered at an ice-cream truck with Share-a-Meal bags at an outdoor event in Scarborough
Our Philosophy

Led by youth, backed by adults

Adults here have a specific job: show up every week, bring the experience and the resources, and stand behind the young people running the work. Youth set the direction. We make sure they have what they need to carry it through — and what their work earns goes back into the neighbourhoods it came from. In this house, everyone is a productive piece of the whole — the young people, the mentors, the community around them, each one carrying part of the work.

Milestones

Our story so far

  1. 2020

    The Good Guides was founded in Scarborough.

  2. 2021

    Founder Swabir Shariff won CharityVillage's Best Individual Contribution to Youth Engagement.

  3. December 2021

    Swabir was featured on Global News' “Making a Difference,” interviewed by Susan Hay.

  4. 2023

    The Good Guides received the City of Toronto's Youth Violence Prevention Grant.

  5. April 2024

    Swabir was inducted into the Scarborough Walk of Fame as a Rising Star.

  6. May 2025

    The Good Guides received a Toronto Community Champion Award (Honourable Mention) from the City of Toronto.

  7. October 2026

    Swabir Shariff was named a QECT 100 Young Leaders Awardee for 2026 and received the award in London.

Our Team

Meet the team

Mentors, project leads, and youth leaders from the same neighbourhoods as the youth they serve. Meet eight of the people — core team and volunteers — behind the programs, events, and community help projects on this site.

Swabir Shariff, Founder & Executive Director

Swabir Shariff

Founder & Executive Director

Born and raised in Scarborough, Swabir founded The Good Guides in 2020 — young people leading the change in their own neighbourhoods, with mentors behind them. He is a QECT 100 Young Leaders Awardee (London, 2026), a One Young World Ambassador, and a Scarborough Walk of Fame Rising Star. He still lives in Scarborough, close to the streets that raised him.

swabir.shariff@thegoodguides.org LinkedIn (opens in new tab)
Christopher Daye, Operations Manager

Christopher Daye

Operations Manager

Christopher has lived and worked in the Scarborough community for most of his life, and has seen it change — too often for the worse — firsthand. As Operations Manager, he keeps our program days and trips running — the excursion days and outings our Ambassadors plan. He enjoys camping, fishing, and trips with the youth.

christopher.daye@thegoodguides.org
Chaz Mais, Project Manager

Chaz Mais

Project Manager

Chaz is a Scarborough resident, and his life here has made him an advocate for its youth. As Project Manager, he leads our community help projects and event days — he is the one handing out gifts and treat bags in the community. He enjoys music, meditating, and spreading positive vibes.

chaz.mais@thegoodguides.org
Alex Ionita, Marketing Specialist

Alex Ionita

Marketing Specialist

Alex is a University of Toronto graduate with a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration. Through basketball and other sports, he helps youth build confidence and life skills that carry off the court.

alex.ionita@thegoodguides.org LinkedIn (opens in new tab)

Abdi Ahmed

Youth Leader

Abdi is a youth leader in his community, focused on giving young people what they need to succeed. His line for them: “Your breakthrough comes from your sacrifice.”

abdi.ahmed@thegoodguides.org
Emmanuel Akingbola, Marketing Specialist

Emmanuel Akingbola

Marketing Specialist

Emmanuel holds a Bachelor of Commerce from Toronto Metropolitan University and is pursuing a Master of Science in Management. Outside of work, he enjoys music, sports, spending time outdoors, and connecting with his community.

emmanuel.akingbola@thegoodguides.org LinkedIn (opens in new tab)

Sabrina Shariff, RN

Development & Safety Coordinator

Sabrina is a Public Health Nurse with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing, and is currently a Master of Education candidate. She gives back by teaching youth and their families about health and healthy living.

sabrina.shariff@thegoodguides.org
Partners

We don't do this work alone

These are the partners who stand alongside our youth.

Schools, businesses, and community organisations plug into this work in six ways. Find yours below — then start a partnership at the bottom of the page.

Partner With Us

Ways to partner

Build a program with us

Our workshops are designed with the partners who deliver them — violence-prevention sessions with the Toronto Police Service's Community Partnership and Engagement Unit. If your organisation runs something our youth should have, let's design the session together.

Take a co-op student

Partner schools place co-op students with us, and their teachers stay in the loop from first day to final evaluation. If your school or workplace can host a placement, a young person gets real hours, real work, and a real reference.

Stand behind an event

Our biggest days are shared days. Funday With Cops and the Toronto Sports Festival run with partner organisations, and the Community Resource Fair puts services in one room for families. Partners bring people, gear, food, and space — the day gets bigger for every one that shows up.

Fund a program day

Program days run on contributions — the barbecue food, the trip buses, the room for graduation. Funding a day, a season, or a single trip puts your support inside a moment the youth will remember, with the Ambassadors running it end to end.

Give what's in your hands

In-kind gifts go straight to work: food for the serving line, sports gear, backpacks, and school supplies in September, gifts and treat bags through the holidays. If your business makes it, stocks it, or has it on a shelf, our youth can use it.

Lend your profession

Some of our strongest sessions are taught by people who do the work for a living — résumé nights, first bank accounts, CPR and first aid, money basics, OSAP walkthroughs. Professionals back the organisation itself, too, with space, skills, and advice. One hour of what you know can change what a young person believes is possible.

Our Partners

The organisations behind the work

Toronto Police Service logo Toronto Police Service Community Partnership and Engagement Unit (opens in new tab) Toronto District School Board logo Toronto District School Board Community partner (opens in new tab) City of Toronto Community partner (opens in new tab)
In the Community

Partnership gallery

Good Guides youth and a partner staff member packing meal boxes and bottled water for a community distribution
Packing meal boxes and bottled water for a community distribution.
Good Guides and Toronto Police Service members at the Doris McCarthy Trail cleanup
Doris McCarthy Trail - Cleanup with the Toronto Police Service — October 26, 2021.
Get Involved

Start a partnership

Tell us what you've got — people, space, skills, or supplies — and we'll find the day it fits.

Start a partnership (opens in new tab)

Prefer email? Partnerships go to Swabir Shariff at swabir.shariff@thegoodguides.org.

Every message goes to our team, and every one gets an answer.

Sharing this with your team? Download our partner one-pager (PDF) (opens in new tab).

Help the next group get started

Donate, volunteer, or partner with us — every season of programs is planned and run by our youth, and it needs backing.

Take Action Partner with us (opens in new tab)

Take Action

Donate or volunteer — and back the work young people are already leading.

Young people here are already leading the work. Donate, volunteer, or partner with us.

Donate

We're an incorporated non-profit in Ontario — not a charity, so donations don't come with a tax receipt. Frequently asked questions below has the full, honest picture.

Monthly donors keep the weekly work going.

Donate (opens in new tab)

Volunteer

Good Guides volunteers mentor youth after school and help run youth-created events like Funday With Cops and the Back to School BBQ. Sign up to become a Good Guide.

Students: a co-op placement is arranged through your school, and it is how you earn school credits as a Good Guide Ambassador. See Our Programs for how placements work.

Sign up to volunteer (opens in new tab)

Every sign-up goes to our team, and every one gets an answer.

Project Manager Chaz handing out gifts and treat bags in the community
Youth and officers playing sports at the Toronto Sports Festival
Good Guides youth exploring Brooks Farms in Mount Albert
Good Questions

Frequently asked questions

Are you a registered charity? Can I get a tax receipt for my donation?

We're an incorporated non-profit in Ontario — not a registered charity — so we can't give you a tax receipt for your donation.

Your contribution still goes straight into the weekly work: after-school mentoring, violence prevention workshops, hot meals delivered to neighbours, and excursion days for youth.

How do I donate?

Donations run through Donorbox. Tap any Donate button on this site and you'll land on our secure donation page — one-time and monthly gifts are both welcome, and monthly donors keep the weekly work going.

Donate through Donorbox (opens in new tab)

Can I donate goods instead of money?

Yes — food, sports gear, school supplies, and holiday gifts all go straight to work. Goods come to us through the partnership route — start with the partnership form (opens in new tab), or see Partners for the ways in. Money donations run through Donorbox — see “How do I donate?” above.

How do I volunteer, become a mentor, or become an Ambassador?

Adults: start with the volunteer sign-up form (opens in new tab) and we’ll be in touch. Our volunteers mentor youth after school and help run youth-created events — showing up week after week is the heart of it.

Students: you don’t sign up here — placements are arranged through your school; see Our Programs.

What ages do you work with?

Our programs are for young people ages 11–18, after the school day ends, in the neighbourhoods they call home. Young people join through their school cohort.

How do I refer a young person?

Teachers, family members, and workers can point a young person to their school. Young people join through their school cohort. Schools can reach us through our Contact page.

Where are you based?

Our office is at 2229 Kingston Rd Unit B, Scarborough, ON M1N 1T8, and our programs run in the neighbourhoods our young people call home.

Can you visit our school? Do you work outside Scarborough?

We visit schools and community centres in the neighbourhoods our youth call home, and we build workshops with our partners there. Our work is rooted in Scarborough — that is where our school cohorts are, and where our programs run.

How can my organisation partner with The Good Guides?

Start with the partnership form (opens in new tab) and tell us what you have in mind. Partners build workshops with us, host co-op students, back event days, and put contributions and in-kind gifts to work for our youth — see Partners for the ways in.

How do I reach you?

Email us at service@thegoodguides.org, or send a message through the form on our Contact page — parents, students, teachers, and businesses will each find the right route there.

Programs

Programs created and run by young people.

The Good Guides doesn't invite youth in to watch. Young people create the programs, run the events, and shape the help their neighbourhoods need — with experienced mentors and the full backing of the organisation behind them.

The Core Program

Everything starts here

Our core program runs two ways: co-op placements for students, and after-school programming for young people. Every event, workshop, and community help project on this page starts here. Ambassadors, our trained youth leaders ages 16–21, are the ones who run it.

Co-op Placements

Co-op placements — Good Guide Ambassadors

We take co-op students from high schools and post-secondary schools. They join the team as Good Guide Ambassadors, earn credits toward graduation, and do the work below in their own neighbourhoods. If you're a student, or a teacher placing one, get in touch.

Ages 11–18

After-school programming

After-school mentoring for ages 11–18, in the neighbourhoods our youth call home.

Students join through partner schools and set cohorts — see “Joining through your school” below for how it works.

Young people practising infant CPR on training manikins at a table during a first aid training session
Contact us about a placement See Ambassador events in the Gallery
For Schools, Teachers & Families

Joining through your school

There are two routes in: a school cohort, or a co-op placement.

Teachers, guidance staff, and community partners can reach out about a cohort or a placement. Families can write to us, and we will confirm whether their school is a partner. If it is not yet, that conversation is how new partnerships start. Funding limits the number of young people we can take on at once, so we work in set cohorts rather than open drop-in enrolment.

Start with a message

Use the contact form or email — whichever is easiest. Schools, partners, and families: in the form, choose Programs under “What’s this about?”

Send us a message (opens in new tab)

Every message goes to our team, and every one gets an answer.

The Weekly Rhythm

A week at The Good Guides

Weekly sessions

After-school sessions run every week with your cohort, in your own neighbourhood — the same mentors, week in and week out.

The mentoring circle

Sessions are built around a mentoring circle: time to check in, talk honestly, and plan what the group builds next. Mentorship isn't an add-on here — it's the centre of the work.

How It Works

It starts with listening

  1. Listen first

    Before anything is planned, we work with the youth to hear their needs and wants.

    They know their streets, their schools, and their lives — so what gets built begins with what they say they need. Nothing here is designed somewhere else and handed down.

  2. The youth build from there

    Ambassadors plan and run what the listening produces.

    Programs & workshops

    Our workshops on preventing violence and settling conflict are delivered in the neighbourhoods our youth call home. Young people pick up résumé writing, financial literacy, CPR & first aid, and job prep through the work itself.

    Events

    Ambassadors created and hosted résumé nights — young people left with a finished résumé — bank-account sign-up events, where youth opened their own accounts, and OSAP sessions that explained how student funding works. The big shared days — Funday With Cops, the Toronto Sports Festival, Community Graduation 2K21, Woburn Basketball Day — are each in the Gallery record.

    Trips & excursions

    Ambassadors don't just go on trips — they choose the destination, plan the day, and run it themselves: farm days, ice fishing, and excursions across the region. Each trip is in the Gallery record.

    Good Guides youth Ambassadors apple-picking at Brooks Farms in Mount Albert

  3. The wider community feels it

    The work doesn't stop at the youth in the room — neighbours, families, and schools feel it where they live.

    Hot meals carried to neighbours living in encampments, gifts and treat bags handed out close to home, a day of relief for single parents on excursion days, and a Community Resource Fair connecting families to services in their own neighbourhoods.

    Neighbours and young people gathered around a serving table at a Good Guides community barbecue
Certifications

Leave with real certifications

Our own mentors run these workshops — practical training, practised in real community work. And our young people come out of them with certifications they can put straight to work.

CPR & first aid

Training to step in when someone is hurt — at a session, at a first job, anywhere.

Food handling

Certified food-handler training, practised in community work like our meal deliveries — and the certification food-service employers ask for.

Babysitting

Babysitting certification, and the skills to be trusted with someone's kids — often a young person's first paid work.

Practical Support

And the practical stuff, handled

Certifications are only part of it. Our mentors sit with young people through the paperwork of growing up — the accounts, applications, and funding that open the next door.

First bank account

Help opening a first bank account — the ID, the paperwork, and what to ask — so a first paycheque has somewhere to land.

OSAP funding

Help applying for OSAP funding for college and university, so money is not the reason a young person does not go.

Post-secondary applications

Support with college and university applications — choosing programs, meeting deadlines, and finishing the forms.

Outcomes

What we count

Since 2020, we have mentored 10,000+ young people. We count the tangible results — and whether a young person shows up differently. Both go back to our funders.

Attendance

Sign-ins at every session. We know who shows up — and we notice who stops.

Certifications earned

Practical certifications, counted as our youth complete them.

Placements completed

Co-op placements finished, and the credits students earn toward graduation.

Confidence & belonging

What young people tell us about themselves — gathered in surveys and check-ins as they go, not just at the end.

Return rate

The share of participants who come back as Ambassadors or mentors, counted cohort by cohort.

Hired — here and beyond

Mentors hired onto our staff team, and young people placed into jobs beyond this house — counted as each one starts.

Your Path Here

The mentored become the mentors

There is a ladder in this house, and every young person in our cohorts can climb it — from participant, to leader, to the mentor someone else looks up to.

  1. Show up

    Join after-school mentoring through your school.

    Your mentors come from your own neighbourhood — people who know your streets and your schools.

  2. Step up

    Take on jobs in the work you helped design.

    Running a résumé night. Hosting a community day. Planning a trip the whole group takes. The work matters, the community is counting on it — and young people rise to it.

  3. Lead

    Become a Good Guide Ambassador.

    However they arrived — a co-op placement, or climbing from the circle — Ambassadors plan and run the programs, sit on the planning team, and lead sessions alongside staff mentors. They earn practical certifications along the way, and students can earn co-op credits doing it.

  4. Come back as a mentor

    Stand behind the next group.

    This program renews itself: many of today's mentors started in the circle. That is how the house stays youth-led, year after year.

  5. Join the staff team

    The path can end in a job here.

    The strongest mentors are hired as staff — running sessions, leading programs. This house is staffed by people who grew up in it.

The Wider Record

What it adds up to

Built on the co-op and after-school core: violence prevention and community engagement in the neighbourhoods our youth call home.

Community engagement

Good Guides youth show up where their neighbours are: sports days alongside neighbourhood officers, graduations for students of every grade, and meals delivered to neighbours living in encampments. With the Toronto Police Service and more than 25 community volunteers, they also cleared a truckload of garbage from the Doris McCarthy Trail. Showing up the same way, week after week, is how trust gets built here.

Contact
Children meeting Toronto Police Service mounted unit officers and their horses at an outdoor community event

More initiatives

Also in the Ambassadors' record:

  • Toronto Sports Festival
  • Back to School BBQ
  • Guided by Giving
  • Community Graduation 2K21
  • Encampment Meal Deliveries
  • Waterfront Cleanup

Our youth are hard at work

Running the co-op and after-school programs at the heart of this page. Donations put more days like these on the calendar.

Donate (opens in new tab)
In the Media

The Good Guides in the media

News features, interviews, and conversations about The Good Guides and the young people leading the work — collected in one place.

June 2023 · City of Toronto

Youth Violence Prevention Grant recipients announced

The City of Toronto's news release announcing the recipients of its Youth Violence Prevention Grant names The Good Guides among the funded organisations.

Read the release (opens in new tab)

December 2021 · Global News

“Making a Difference” feature

Global News' Susan Hay visits The Good Guides to see how young people in Scarborough are stepping up to mentor each other.

Watch the segment (opens in new tab)

February 2022 · CP24

CP24 Tonight panel on youth violence

Swabir Shariff joins a CP24 Tonight panel to talk about youth violence in Toronto — and about the mentoring work happening on the ground in Scarborough.

Watch the panel (opens in new tab)

November 2021 · Scarborough Mirror

“Open door” for Scarborough youth

Mike Adler profiles the Good Guide Ambassadors — young people deciding for themselves how they want to help their own neighbourhood.

Read the article (opens in new tab)

November 2021 · CharityVillage

CharityVillage's inaugural youth-engagement award

Swabir Shariff wins CharityVillage's inaugural Best Individual Contribution to Youth Engagement award. President Mary Barroll then sat down with him for a CharityVillage Connects interview — Episode 2, released December 2021.

Listen to the interview (opens in new tab)

Press or coverage questions? Reach the team through our Contact page.

Contact

Mentoring for your child, a co-op placement, a partnership, or just a question — get in touch.

We're an incorporated non-profit based in Scarborough, Ontario. Our work runs in the neighbourhoods our young people call home — and we want to hear from the people who live in them.

Send us a message and tell us what you need — the emails below will get you to the right person.

A parent looking for a mentor for your child

Parents and youth: start with General Enquiries.

A student or teacher asking about a co-op placement

Use Co-op & Student Placements.

A local business that wants to back our youth

Partnerships is the route.

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