Empower Women! Support New Leaf Bakery

Empower Women! Support New Leaf Bakery
By: Liz Hogan
 
Transitions New Leaf Bakery Café is a job training program that provides women in need opportunities to develop personal and professional skills for employment in the food service industry.  Our program is specifically designed to combine work experiences with personal coaching to create success in the women we serve.  One woman’s success has a ripple effect throughout the community beginning with an improved sense of self worth and marketable skills leading to a more sustainable lifestyle.  Improved self-esteem and greater self confidence translate into marketable skills for employment and the ability to manage a healthy personal life.
 
The program also includes front of house training in our New Leaf Bakery Café located in Catholic Charities
at 12 E. 5th Ave, where the women learn barista skills, gain cash register experience and practice good customer service.  We host work readiness classes which assist each woman in developing a resume highlighting the skills she has learned. We provide job leads and preparation classes for interviews to help the women in their efforts to find suitable employment in the food service industry. 
 
Transitions Growing Hope Garden Project is another aspect of the New Leaf Bakery that provides an opportunity for women to grow in a sense of well being.   Women learn gardening techniques while producing good healthy foods to use personally, for sharing with other women at the Hearth Women’s Drop in Center or for use in the New Leaf training kitchen.  Our goal is to create a sustainable cycle of growing produce, preparing it in the kitchen, serving it to customers, and then composting the kitchen waste back into the earth.
 
The New Leaf Bakery Café is a social purpose business generating revenue to support its training program.  We teach the women we serve to be self-sustaining and we have the same goal for ourselves as a business.  We have recently been able to make the purchase of a delivery van, which has greatly increased our ability to serve our customers.
 
New Leaf Bakery is a program of Transitions.  Other programs of Transitions include: The Women’s Hearth, Transitional Living Center, EduCare, and Miryam’s House. Transitional Programs for Women provide supportive, healing environments for women and their families. Rooted in the values of, community, respect, growth and wholeness and justice, each program becomes a place where Women and Families Grow!
 
Learn more about these programs at www.help4women.org.
 
How You Can Get Involved
• Become a Transitions donor
• Volunteer your expertise
• Offer in-kind donations to support a social purpose
• Mentor a New Leaf Trainee
• Refer potential participants to the program
• Employ our graduates
• Access our catering service