Program helps put North Texans with criminal pasts on a new career path

A federally funded program is giving men and women a way to earn success by putting their criminal pasts behind them.

FOREST HILL, Texas - A federally funded program is giving men and women a way to earn success by putting their criminal pasts behind them.

The group is trained into a new profession that sprouts a new career, and many times, a new life.

With sparks flying, 24-year-old Darion Deen’s life is changing, as he works toward a future as a top notch welder. This comes after a brush with the law that nearly cost him his freedom.

"I had to take a charge, which really affected me being able to get jobs, grants, scholarship, if I did want to go back to school. It was an impasse I wasn't expecting to go through,” Deen explained.

Kevin Moreno is 19 and has battled a drug addiction.

"I’m tired of disappointing my parents. I want to get my life together and start making them proud,” he said.

The small program, The Community Learning Center (CLC), is tucked away in the Fort Worth suburb of Forest Hill.

Federal funding provides vocational training in a half dozen fields.

"They have many barriers you and I would never realize. Family at home dysfunctions, educational disabilities never diagnosed, then, of course, the inevitable drugs, alcohol, gang involvement,” program director Frank Kuykendall said. “The initiative from the government, and certainly our initiative, is to reach out to these young people and do our best to help them change their lives."

CLC and its committed staff has seen 65 people successfully complete the program and land jobs with companies it partners with.

Its available funding could cover twice as many students, so they're spreading the word through people like Deen and Moreno.

"My dad really wanted me to do this. He's happy that I'm here, that I found this by myself, that I came here by myself,” Moreno said.

"I'm very happy and blessed to be in this situation," Deen added.