Emma's Torch

Emma’s Torch is a non-profit social enterprise whose mission is to train refugees, asylees, and survivors of human trafficking in the culinary arts and to empower them to build meaningful careers.

Our Culinary Training Program combines classroom and on-the-job training in our social ventures to help our students enter a pathway to economic mobility. Every 6 weeks, we welcome cohorts of 10-15 students into our full-time, fully-paid program, and, by the end of the program, each student earns wages of over $7,400 and has the skills they need to start new careers. We partner with Brooklyn’s restaurant community to place our graduates into upwardly mobile jobs to launch their culinary careers, providing two years of ongoing support for alumni. By focusing on empowering refugees at the grassroots level, we help to create system change, led by the newest members of our communities. 

Since our founding, our programs have transformed the lives of over 975 students. In 2025, we placed 82% of our 213 graduates into upwardly mobile jobs. Six months later, 75% remained employed, which is over 3 times the industry average. What distinguishes Emma's Torch is that these outcomes are just the beginning. In 2025, graduates' starting salaries averaged over 7x their pre-program earnings. Over the past decade, we’ve created $46 million in cumulative wage gains, with projected earnings continuing to rise.

Today, refugees and asylees face direct threats from sweeping federal policies that restrict access to critical programs like SNAP, limit work authorization, and fundamentally reshape refugee resettlement, taking a real toll on our students' well-being. Despite this increasingly hostile environment, what hasn’t changed – and what will never change – is our dedication to the mission. We will always provide training, career development, and a supportive community to our students and alumni, and we are proud to help bridge the opportunity gap and offer a path toward stability and upward mobility. By adapting our program, investing in trauma-informed care, and strengthening employer partnerships, we’ve been able to continue delivering meaningful outcomes in a shifting landscape.