Sophia Garden in the Rogers Park neighborhood

The Marjorie Kovler Center for the Treatment of Survivors of Torture works with refugees and political asylees who have arrived in Chicago from all over the world. Angelic Organics Learning Center regularly hosts groups of Kovler Center refugees at our farm. These therapeutic farm visits reconnect them with their agricultural heritage, often for the first time since leaving their home country.

We have also helped the Kovler Center bring the farm experience a little closer to home—at the nearby Chicago Waldorf School’s Sophia Garden in Rogers Park. Kovler clients now have regular opportunities to use the farming skills they brought from their home country. They help maintain the garden, share knowledge with the students and teachers at the Chicago Waldorf School, and use their freshly harvested produce in multi-cultural cooking workshops at the Kovler Center.

The Learning Center helped establish two beehives on the roof of the Kovler Center. Two community members, drawing on their experience as beekeepers in Bosnia, have been inspired to manage the hives and teach others at the Kovler Center. Now the rooftop is home to 10 hives, and people involved in the project are working with the Learning Center to market their urban honey.