[The following final update was written by the organization and then sent to us for further sharing.]

Over the past year, Coffee With A Cause has made solid progress towards the launch of its Highland Park site and the first three cohorts of barista interns trained there. Seventeen youth have already benefited from the program, gaining not only hands-on barista experience but also the confidence, mentorship, and professional skills to pursue meaningful careers. Our team has built strong relationships with new referral agencies and local nonprofits, expanding our network of partners committed to supporting Transitional Age Youth in the community.

As our presence in Highland Park has grown, so too has our visibility and identity. Through countless conversations with neighbors, customers, and local organizations, Rosebud Coffee has become recognized as more than just a cafe. We are a place where young people are seen, supported, and encouraged to thrive. The number of youth applying to and enrolling in our internship program has nearly doubled, demonstrating both increased demand and trust in our mission. Impressively, 90% of our program graduates continue to secure employment or enroll in school, a success rate that has remained steady since our founding.

This work is made possible by the dedication of 12 volunteer mentors who work directly with our interns, providing encouragement, guidance, and real-world insights. Together, this collective effort, of youth, mentors, staff, and community partners, reflects the growing impact of Coffee With A Cause in creating pathways to purpose and sustainable employment for young people in Los Angeles.

Coffee With A Cause (CWAC) is expanding its successful social enterprise and doubling the impact of its job training program for TAY, who have experienced foster care, homelessness, and justice system involvement. While the new cafe will not be open until next month, we are establishing our presence in Highland Park by building partnerships with local businesses, and youth service organizations. Our Pop Up coffee experience in Highland Park has trained 17 youth and paired them with 12 volunteer mentors in advance of the opening of the coffee shop.

Angelica Solis is a standout intern from Highland Park. Among the first cohort, she trained at the Pop Up coffee experience and impressed the staff and customers. Angelica was promoted to shift lead and asked to be a keynote speaker at the Coffee With A Cause Milestone Ceremony. At the ceremony, she said “I’m standing here today, proud, caffeinated, and so incredibly thankful. Thank you for investing in people like me, like my peers. Your support is the reason I now see a path forward, not just in coffee, but in life. And to my fellow interns: here’s to grinding it out, literally and figuratively, and brewing up something great for our futures.” Angelica is now serving as the Pop Up supervisor training the new interns and waiting to take her full time position at the new shop when it opens in a month.

Our primary objective was the build-out and renovation of our new Highland Park café on Figueroa Street, expanding Coffee With A Cause’s social enterprise model. This goal was successfully met, with construction nearing completion and the soft opening scheduled for November 2025.

In Highland Park, 17 Transitional Age Youth (TAY) began their journey toward self-sustaining careers, joining 33 Pasadena interns in our workforce readiness program. Twelve dedicated mentors supported these Highland Park youth as they transitioned into jobs. In addition, we have integrated the community into Coffee With A Cause with the cafe manager, several baristas and two new board of directors who are Highland Park residents.

The youth training program was upgraded with two weeks of Soft Skill training followed by 160+ hours of on-site work experience. The youth practiced their pulling of espresso shots, and latte art while studying for the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) Barista certificate. 13 youth passed the online and in-person test to earn the SCA Barista certificate.

Finally, we exceeded expectations by engaging seven new community and business partners across Northeast Los Angeles, strengthening local collaboration and ensuring a more sustainable and connected program network.

While we had hoped to open by early 2025, we experienced several challenges with contractors, permitting offices and inspectors. Most notably, the power requirements of the kitchen were significantly increased because of a lack of access to gas under the city’s new green initiatives. The power panel required an upgrade from single phase to three phase this resulted in waiting for Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. To solve these issues our Executive Director Dan Davidson jumped to work alongside our contractors and inspectors to push progress forward. We now have a soft opening date of November 15.

Each intern and supervisor fills out a program evaluation form at the end of their cohort. This allows for us to receive feedback, make changes, and continuously grow our program to better fit the needs of our youth and partnership. Over the last year, 95% of our intern evaluations have come back positive; highlighting their appreciation for the opportunities, the relationships, and the skills they’ve learned. The other 5% provided feedback that they wanted more hours. On the supervisors side, 90% of evaluations have been positive about both our interns and our program. The other 10% provided feedback that the time lags in stipend from funding sources outside of our organization can be challenging. Overall, our program continues to receive strong positive feedback on all sides.

The Bad: City Hall takes longer than expected. Permits are difficult to pull and meet requirements and there is a subjective nature of inspections. It seems to be a never ending process of inspections, improvements, and more inspections. Further, we found a perfect location in Highland Park based on its proximity to access to public transportation for our youth but have met difficulties with an all electric build out to meet city requirements for green standards.

The Good: In order to provide barista internships for our Highland Park Youth, we worked with Optimist Youth to set up a Pop Up coffee experience across the street from their campus to serve the community. Over the months, we have built a loyal following of neighbors out walking their dogs. A free pup cup for each dog means that our team members know the name of all the dogs in the neighborhood.

Through our struggles with city permitting and inspection that slowed down the opening of the shop, we have turned to our partners to help us during the transition. Optimist Youth offered us space across the street from their campus to set up our Pop Up to train Highland Park youths. They also now provide meeting space for our Soft Skills Training at no charge. Since we now offer internship opportunities in Northeast LA, we have working and standing MOUs with Didi Hirsch Mental Health Services and their TAY clubhouse, Our Third Space as well as LAUSD Continuing Education’s work readiness and work-based learning departments.

As a bonus, after attending the Hands-On AI Training for Nonprofits with LA2050, we were inspired to bring AI and automated systems into our organization. Using the SmartSheet platform and integrating DocuSign, Zapier and ClickLink, we have created SpringBoard to better capture and deliver numbers and reports as will has help with the transition from a cohort model model to a monthly enrollment with text based reminders to the youth all all import documents and deadlines over their 122 months with the program.

With additional support from the Young Adults Forward Foundation funding $100k and the Hauswirth Foundation donating $85k, Rosebud Highland Park is well positioned to thrive. The soft opening of the Highland Park café is set for November 2025. We’ll continue to expand our impact through monthly youth enrollment, new community job sites, and stronger mentor and referral partnerships. We’ve also deepened our local roots by adding two Highland Park board members and onboarding a TAY Job Specialist and a Compliance & Finance Manager to support program growth.

Media Pieces:

• NBC Channel 4
• Fox 11 Good Day Live