Sunflower Community

From The Glass Gazette: February 2020 As the county strengthens its pipelines to workforce development, non-profit organizations like Sunflower Bakery are taking the lead by providing on-the-job training to adults over 18-years-old that struggle with learning differences. I recently visited the Sunflower Bakery’s new facility in Rockville and was amazed by the technical and transferable… Read More

People with learning differences all over the world struggle with finding jobs to support themselves. This is because for people with learning differences it may be very difficult to perform basic skills needed to qualify for a job. However, non-profit organizations help people receive these opportunities. One of those organizations is a bakery in Gaithersburg,… Read More

Sunflower Bakery is a nonprofit organization that helps people with learning differences gain important business skills. I am writing as a participant in Sunflower’s Bnei Mitzvah program. Here, I have been taught a lot about non-profit organizations, different types of learning disabilities, and important baking and business skills. Sunflower makes many different treats, from simple… Read More

Choice Hotels included Sunflower Bakery at their Disability Inclusion Celebration for being named “One of the Best Places to Work for People with Disabilities.” Sunflower Bakery provided cakes for their event and Daphna Raskas, Executive Director, was honored to be invited to speak at their Celebration. The following article appeared in the Voice of Choice… Read More

Meet Eliana Reiter, a recent Bnei Mitzvah participant and a wonderful Sunflower Bakery volunteer The following is an excerpt from her Bat Mitzvah speech (May 28, 2018): This year I participated in the Sunflower Bakery Bnei Mitzvah Seeds Program. Sunflower bakery is a non-profit bakery that employs young adults with disabilities and teaches them to… Read More

In my recent visit to Cafe Sunflower I was struck by the warm welcome I received, the friendly employees and the quality of the baked goods on hand. I am the reigning Ms. New York America 2018 and I flew to the D.C. in an effort to learn more about Sunflower Bakery and Cafe Sunflower…. Read More

My name is Elka Green & I am in the Bnei Mitzvah program. Every Sunday we go to the bakery or the cafe. We first talk about the Sunflower Bakery and what they do. We once spoke about our 5 senses and how important they are. We put gloves on with some of our fingers… Read More

When Michael was asked to describe our NIH patrons from next door, he answered succinctly “loyal customers.” Loyal customers they are indeed. Two years ago, William Barker, who the group calls Bill or “the Chief,” had heard that there was a café in the new Jewish Federation Building. There was only one problem, he didn’t… Read More

Steve Rakitt, CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Washington, honored us June 8 at our Annual Appreciation and Graduation Event with a beautiful message to our graduates. Steve has been an inspirational Sunflower Bakery advocate and has had a significant impact on expanding the leadership role of the Jewish community in providing greater access… Read More

According to the Montgomery County Commission on People with Disabilities Annual Report 2016, 70% of young adults with disabilities ages 17-34 have cognitive disabilities and 55% of Montgomery County Public School students with disabilities ages 3-21 are students with autism, a specific learning disability or speech/language impairment. As you can imagine, if you’re a young adult with a… Read More