2025 Beneficiaries

 

  • LRAEF is a 501 (c)3 non-profit organization that was founded in 1995 and is governed by a board of directors made up of restaurants, industry experts and educators in the hospitality industry. The Louisiana Restaurant Association Education Foundation exists to enhance the industry’s service to the public through education, community engagement and promotion of career opportunities.

    The three main programs that LRAEF offers are ProStart, a high school culinary and restaurant management program; the LRAEF Scholars, which provides scholarships to students pursuing a degree in culinary arts or hospitality; and the Restaurant Youth Registered Apprenticeship, which is an earn as your learn program.

  • Founded in 1921, Delgado’s Culinary Arts Program is one of the College’s oldest and premier programs in New Orleans. It offers students an opportunity to earn a Culinary Arts Associate degree with a concentration in Baking and Pastry Arts or as a Professional Culinarian. Students can also choose to receive a Culinary Arts Certificate in one of three areas of study: Culinary Management, Pastry Arts, and Culinary Arts: Line Cook.

  • A signature program of FirstLine Schools connecting children to food, the natural world, and community. Edible Schoolyard New Orleans creates nourishing environments, providing quality edible education, and fostering community within schools. The aim of the program is to ensure the long-term well-being of students, families, and school communities by bringing hands-on kitchen and garden classes into the school curriculum and culture. The students maintain the beautiful school gardens that stimulate curiosity and provide a safe space for social and emotional development. The process supports core academic learning while using the garden and kitchen environments.

 Past Beneficiaries

  • In January 2019 NOCHI will launch with certificate programs in Culinary Arts and Baking and Pastry Arts. These programs were developed in partnership with CIA (Culinary Institute of America) consulting to provide rigorous, hands-on training for higher wage middle skills jobs. Each program provides approximately 650 hours of instruction over a course of twenty weeks and provides a similar number of lab hours as tough in a traditional two-year associates degree program.

  • Café Reconcile has transformed the lives of more than 1,700 young people since opening in 2000. The program works with more than 90 new “opportunity youth” per year and over 250 alumni — young people aged 16-24 who lack employment and educational opportunities or both.

  • The Nunez Culinary Arts program prepares students for jobs in bakeries, restaurants, hotels, schools, and cafés. The Culinary Entrepreneurship program brings together principals of small business management with culinary skills for students who want to own their own food-industry business.

  • The SoFAB Institute documents and celebrates the food and drink of all cultures through exhibits, programming, and a range of media. Because everyone eats, all aspects of food and drink—culture and geography, anthropology and history, economics and politics, law and policy, media and the arts, science and technology—reveal the state of the world. SoFAB, home to the Southern Food & Beverage Museum, Museum of the American Cocktail, Pacific Food & Beverage, SoFAB Communities, Culinaria Policy Center, John & Bonnie Boyd Hospitality & Culinary Library, and SoFAB Media, is among the nation's most comprehensive cultural institutions studying food and drink.

  • Edible Schoolyard New Orleans (ESY NOLA) changes the way children eat, learn and live at FirstLine Schools in New Orleans, through a comprehensive, hands-on food education program that integrates organic gardening and seasonal cooking into the school curriculum, culture and cafeteria food programs. Our schoolyard gardens, teaching kitchens and reformed school cafeteria menus involve students in all aspects of growing, harvesting, preparing and enjoying food together, as a means of awakening their senses, cultivating a school environment that promotes a sense of pride and responsibility for our land and natural resources, and developing a love of fresh, seasonal foods.

  • The New Orleans Center for Creative Arts is Louisiana’s high school conservatory. The Culinary Arts Department offers a four-year course of study for talented and disciplined students who aspire to be chefs. NOCCA’s Culinary Arts program was developed in collaboration with the Emeril Lagasse Foundation and supported by Johnson & Wales University, which has created the first of its kind curriculum for high school students.

  • Culinary Arts is one of Delgado's premier programs, training students for careers in the food services and the restaurant industry. The Culinary Arts Department provides academic instruction through both theoretical and hands-on experiences; as well as, supervised practical work experience in the field of food service, culinary arts, and the hospitality industry.

  • The John Folse Culinary Institute is dedicated to the preservation and advancement of Louisiana’s rich culinary heritage. NOWFE’s annual donation funds a scholarship for the top culinary students to travel to the Bocuse Institute, in France, where they get hands-on experience with the French roots of Louisiana culinary traditions.

Interested in becoming a NOWFE beneficiary?
Please contact our Executive Director, Aimee Brown at aimee.brown@nowfe.com.