Teach professional sewing skills and job-readiness and job-retention skills. This is a training initiative that lasts 8-10 weeks with the finding of work or launching of employment activities as the culmination of the project. Training includes basic writing and math skills. There is follow-up support for a year following "graduation". Mothers Together, Inc also provides opportunites for women who sew to become entrepreneurs - linking the women to outside contract opportunities.

Women, Economic Development

50,000 families in New York City will be ineligable for welfare in September, 2001 and the city does not have jobs for all of these people. Women with little or no education can excell at sewing. There are significant opportunities for small sewing contracts in the greater New York City region. For women who have been disempowered, it is critical for them to realise that they have something to offer - to eachother - in a cooperative work setting. The learning goes much further than sewing; they begin to use eachother as resources and support.

Once a month, Mothers Together, Inc sponsors a "Free Arts Day" (part of the National Free Arts for Abused Children) for families who are "in danger of abuse" to work and play together in a supportive, creative environment.

Mothers Together, Inc collaborates with the New York Work Alliance to find work for the women. The facilities, including technical sewing equipment, computers, and bookkeeping services, of Mothers Together, Inc. are available to all graduates and trainees of the project indefinitely.