PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Michael Vick, speaking to a group of Philadelphia high school students Tuesday, warned against the dangers of peer pressure and offered himself as a cautionary tale of what can happen when someone is a follower instead of a leader.

The Philadelphia Eagles quarterback, who served prison time for running a dogfighting ring, addressed a rapt audience of 200 freshmen on their first day at Nueva Esperanza Academy, a North Philadelphia charter school. He urged the students to make the right choices and to resist the temptation to follow the crowd.

“I didn’t choose to go the right way, which led to 18 months in prison, which was the toughest time of my life,” he said. “Being away from my family, being away from my kids who I adore dearly, and being away from the game of football, doing something so foolish, and I wish I could take it all back.

“I was influenced by so many people when I should have been a leader.”

The 10-minute talk marked Vick’s first anti-dogfighting public appearance in Philadelphia since he signed a one-year, $1.6 million deal with the Eagles on Aug. 13. At the time, he expressed a desire “to be part of the solution and not the problem” by speaking to children around the country about dogfighting.

Speaking without notes, Vick told the hushed assembly Tuesday that his poor decisions imperiled the goals he had set for himself.

“Growing up, I had dreams and I always wanted to have this great, lavish life and make it to the NFL, go and accomplish great things and leave a great legacy. That was my goal from a young kid,” Vick said.

“My future was promising … at some point, I got sidetracked.”

He said he tried to do the right things at school and at home, “but I had another side to me, and it was a dark side.”

Vick visited the school with Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of the Humane Society of the United States.”

He is fresh off a 23-month jail sentence that dates back to 2007 and was released from federal custody on July 20.

• Joann Loviglio