Jeremiah Alexander is a returning graduate of the Willow Bean Café’s Barista Training Program, which employs people recovering from mental illness.

Willow Bean baristas brew a good cup of coffee. But this Café also serves something money can’t buy: hope.

“Working at the Willow Bean Café has given me confidence and skills,” says Jeremiah Alexander, a graduate of the Café’s first Barista Training Program in 2013.

Located on the VGH campus, the Café is a social enterprise designed to provide opportunities for supported employment training and competitive work as baristas for people recovering from mental illness.

“This job showed me what I’m capable of,” says Jeremiah, who has borderline personality disorder and generalized anxiety disorder. Since graduating from the program, Jeremiah has returned to the Café in a new position that provides peer support and mentorship to barista trainees. As Senior Barista, Jeremiah will support about a dozen individuals who participate in the training program each year.

The Café is in the lobby of the Willow Pavilion, an adult mental health facility at VGH, and Jeremiah says its location is one of the reasons the Café is so successful. “It’s hard to feel alone there. A lot of customers are therapists and staff who actively support recovery. It’s an environment of people invested in healing,” he explains. “I love the coffee shop and the Pavilion.”

We are grateful to our generous donors for supporting this unique initiative, including the Face of Today Foundation, which has committed to support three trainees under the age of 30 to participate in the program. Almost $40,000 is needed annually to keep this valuable program going for the next three years.