CLEVELAND — When it comes to fine dining and French cuisine, EDWINS on Shaker Square is a popular choice.
EDWINS Leadership & Restaurant Institute is well known for its second chance culinary program that helps formerly incarcerated men and women learn new skills.
"It’s even harder for someone with a strike or two against them or coming out of a hard spot. This is like a necessary step," explains EDWINS founder and CEO Brandon Chrostowski.
Many in the leadership and restaurant institute have children. Those that do are dropping out at alarming rates.
"80% of the time, someone comes into our program with a child, they don’t finish. They means there’s a 20% completion rate for people with kids. It’s not sustainable," explains Chrostowski.
Now, EDWINS is offering more help to students who have struggled to find child care. Chrostowski has decided to open a child care center, all non-profit, free of charge.
"Child care is essential. Safe, good child care is going to be an essential building block to your future," he adds.
It will be located in a commercial building on Larchmere, walking distance from Shaker Square and EDWINS for students who won't need to find transportation to pick up children.
Chrostowski has been able to raise more than $350,000 to purchase and renovate the building that will be able to accommodate 20 children on the first floor, although they will start with 12.
"The second floor upstairs there, we’ll use for offices for our case management," explains Chrostowski. "A family drop-in center if there needs to be some after-school program or activity."
It's the perfect addition to a program that has given hundreds of people a fresh start.
"We have a student right now with four children, she’s doing the program," Chrostowski says. "It's tough. Finding after-hour child care, child care when it’s needed. It’s a big hurdle, but now we’re going to start clearing that."
EDWINS also has a second chance life skills center where participants also live rent-free. The day care is another one of those wrap-around services. Chrostowski hopes to have it open in the next two to three months.
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