OUR STORY
Ada's goal is to stay true to its mission of hiring, training, creating careers and ultimately empowering our employees with disabilities. Now, more than ever, we have realized the value of the work we do to elevate those with disabilities and to foster an understanding and better sense of what community means.
With your help, we will be able to continue our great work that is changing the lives of our employees and helping to redefine the value of work. Ada's Cafe is a registered 501(c)(3) Non-Profit Corporation. Contributions to Ada's Cafe are tax - deductible.
As the mother of a child with a developmental disability, Kathleen Hughes, owner and founder of Ada’s Café, wanted to create opportunities to empower her son and help him be independent. Of particular concern for Kathleen and her family are the negative stereotypes linked, in part, to misconceptions and assumptions about the capabilities of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Consequently, people with disabilities face a daunting uphill battle as they transition out of school and into the workforce, as well as significant barriers in other areas of life, such as socializing and creating opportunities to make or get together with friends. Kathleen's quest to catalyze a change in mentality and societal barriers within her community started when Charlie was in middle school.
As Charlie started middle school, Kathleen opened a café where she taught cooking skills to students with special needs. More importantly, however, Kathleen created an opportunity to celebrate, promote, and enhance, at an early age, her students’ unique and valuable life-work skills, perspectives, and contributions. Kathleen’s mission and commitment to elevating the lives of young adults with disabilities followed Charlie to high school, where she opened another café, which operated as a separate day class, independently run by students with disabilities and their high school peers.
When Charlie graduated high school, Kathleen opened Ada’s Café. This non-profit corporation exemplifies her lifelong dedication and mission to ensure equal opportunities in the lives and workplaces of people with disabilities.
Ada’s café is committed to upholding and defending the rights of people with disabilities by building an inclusive workforce and improving accessibility benefits for their employees.
History of Ada’s Cafe.
What’s In A Name?
Ada’s Café is also the namesake of Kathleen’s grandma, whose home in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, provided a warm and welcoming environment for Kathleen and all the neighborhood kids who would stop by Grandma Ada’s house and sample whatever she was cooking for the day. An integral part of Kathleen’s mission to change existing stereotypes and societal barriers facing people with disabilities is by fostering Grandma Ada’s warm and welcoming “everyone belongs” mentality at Ada’s Café.
These are the two foundational inspirations behind the name and meaning of Ada’s Café, and they also inform its three core values: commercial success, community involvement, and compassionate employment. Kathleen is honored and humbled to serve and embody these values as a chef, mother, activist, and advocate for her employees in an environment “Where Good Food and Community Meet.”