Village Institute

About The Village Institute

The Village Institute is a live/learn/work center for single-mother refugee families. This holistic model brings housing, language learning, childcare, job readiness workshops, and mental health services under one roof. The building doubles as a multicultural childcare center and refugee entrepreneurship incubator, with the vision of becoming financially sustainable and empowerment-driven.

The visionary behind the Village Institute is Ellie Adelman, a graduate of the University of Denver’s Graduate School of Social Work who participated in the Barton Institute’s Social Enterprise Fellowship Program in 2018/19. Ellie created the program in deep partnership with refugee women and families with support from DU’s Project X-ITE. She opened the Village Institute in early 2020, and is in the process of launching the Little Village childcare center now.

In alignment with our goal of supporting safe community spaces where people can develop the opportunities to thrive, the Barton Institute welcomed the opportunity to serve as the Village Institute’s fiscal sponsor as it seeks its own 501(c)(3) nonprofit status.