It Started with a cookie - Stories of impact with touch a Heart
Collaboration in Action: Touch A Heart + HWFC
Second Chances, New Paths: Stories of Transformation
When compassion meets opportunity, transformation follows.
At the Hawai‘i Workforce Funders Collaborative (HWFC), we know that true workforce transformation begins with people — with stories that show how compassion and opportunity can rebuild lives. This month (October 2025), in partnership with Touch A Heart, we launched Second Chances, New Paths: Stories of Transformation — a three-part storytelling mini-series that lifts up the voices of those finding renewal through meaningful work and community, and highlights how social enterprise can restore dignity, create new beginnings, and strengthen Hawai‘i’s workforce.
From Connection to Collaboration
Our partnership story began — fittingly — with a cookie. In 2023, HWFC’s Director of Community Programs, LorMona Meredith, met Touch A Heart’s Executive Director, Robin Kumabe, through their Baker’s Heart cookies — an employment social enterprise initiative that embodies compassion through action. Months later, after reconnecting at the Chaminade University’s Pathways to Meaningful Work Symposium, a shared vision began to take shape: to lift up the human stories behind workforce transformation and highlight how compassion and opportunity can work hand in hand.
“The series was born from our shared belief that transformation begins with human stories,” Mona shared. “We wanted to highlight how compassion, training, and second chances can build stronger communities.”
Community-Driven Change in Action
The consecutive weekly sessions in Second Chances, New Paths explored reentry, job training, and transformation through the voices of Touch A Heart’s leadership, staff and program graduates. Each conversation offered a candid look at what it takes to rebuild a life through human-centered workforce innovation — and how inclusive social enterprises in Hawai‘i can serve as powerful engines for both personal and systemic change, especially for our justice-impacted residents seeking a second chance to thrive.
“It helped us articulate our work to a new audience focused on workforce transformation,” Robin shared. “It gave us a vision for what it takes for employers to be ready for this demographic—and how this workforce can truly transform Hawai‘i.”
Watch the mini-series recordings and session materials here:
