For the residents of Magdalene St. Louis, undoing the damage of human trafficking amounts to a full-time effort. Women admitted to the two-year program may have been sexually abused from as early as seven years old, with drugs and prostitution derailing their lives by thirteen.
But healing can take many forms, and at Magdalene that process will soon involve the chance to earn a living wage while marketing and promoting an apparel company.
Called Bravely, the company will provide paying jobs to five or six residents at a time, with the only requirement being successful completion of a six month stay in the Old North-based treatment community.
"They are a group of very skilled and resilient women, but they have trouble getting employment," explains Magdalene St. Louis executive director Hope Jernagan. "They have arrests on their records and have experienced so much trauma in their lives. Our idea is to create a business to help them overcome the trauma and help them build resiliency in the workplace."
Earlier this week, Magdalene launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise $50,000 to assist with startup and payroll funding for the first year of operation.…