who we are
SOK Foundation
Our organization brings empowerment, safety, and life skills to children in need.
The SOK Foundation helps children in need gain a sense of security and develop the life skills that lead to empowerment. In our work we combine acting from the heart with thinking like a business and a first response team’s sense of urgency—we love working on behalf of children, we know how to get real results, and we don’t waste time because time won’t wait.
We’re creating a better world for children in need.
We empower adults that children depend on.
Our foundation’s name—SOK—is an acronym for Samodzielność od Kuchni, which is an idiom connecting self-reliance with kitchen know-how and grassroots organizing. And because in Polish sok means juice, our name captures sweetness, color, and nourishment in a way that evokes the notions of optimism and well-being that are foundational to a happy childhood.
What we Do
Our primary causes
SOK was founded in 2018 to help children and adolescents gain the life skills that lead to increased independence, resiliency, and empowerment. We started with cooking classes for kids in foster care, but when the war in Ukraine broke out we immediately pivoted to addressing the urgent needs of refugee minors suddenly displaced into Polish schools.
We analyzed the challenges placed upon teachers throughout the country and fast-tracked designing training programs on Polish as a foreign language and psychosocial skill development to communicate effectively with others, manage emotions and behavior, and adapt to different social situations.
From the beginning of the war we have been assisting refugee kids in adapting to the new reality and rebuilding their sense of well-being. Thanks to the scalability of reaching individual children through training their teachers and caretakers, in 2022 alone we were able to affect the lives of twenty thousand Ukrainian refugee minors displaced to Poland because of the war.
Refugees in Polish Schools
We connect those who need help with those who can help by creating interactive, learner-centered, highly practical, and directly applicable workshop and courses for children in need and the care-takers.
EDUCATORS
REFUGEE CHILDREN
HOURS OF LEARNING
Our Team
Katia Roman-Trzaska
Co-founder, CEO
Former lawyer, co-founder and owner of Little Chef Cooking School for Kids. Since 2007 Little Chef trained over 120,000 children. Established innovative hands-on cooking programs for schools connected with school curriculum (history, geography, math etc.). Mentor at Women’s Enterprise Foundation (Sieć Przedsiębiorczych Kobiet) helping women start and lead their own businesses. Co-founder SOK Foundation which helps young people from orphanages gain confidence thru learning basic life skills such as cooking. Leads large scale, longterm humanitarian projects during pandemic and currently for war refugees, especially children, from Ukraine.
Iga Pietrusińska
Board Member, MHPSS Program Coordinator and PR
Iga is responsible for psychosocial support projects. She is a co-creator of trainings for teachers and foster care educators. As an educator and trainer in non-specialized psychosocial support, she primarily uses the methods and training of the American Center for Mind Body Medicine and the Community Stress Prevention Center of Israel. She is responsible for the implementation of Learning Passport, a teacher training platform created for UNICEF by Microsoft.
Danuta Kowalska-Molak
Chief Financial Officer
Specialist in clearing projects co-financed from EU funds – the European Parliament and the European Commission – and from national entities. SShe coordinated and managed the settlement of Gazeta Wyborcza and Gazeta Wyborcza Foundation projects, such as EU4You, Sonar Europe, Our Europe, Looking for Golden Stars, Tenderness and Freedom, #EuropeIsInteresting, among others. Graduate of Warsaw University and SGH in the field of EU funds administration.At the SOK Foundation – Chief Financial Officer.
Kamila Dembińska
Polish as a Second Language Program Coordinator
Graduated in Iberian studies from the University of Warsaw, completed doctoral studies at the Faculty of Applied Linguistics at the University of Warsaw. Lecturer of Polish as a foreign language since 1998. In the years 2004-2010 Polish language teacher at the College of Europe in Natolin. Founder of the school of Polish as a foreign language KLUB DIALOGU, author of teaching materials, trains teachers of Polish as a foreign language. Responsible for creating and coordinating programs of Polish language promotion in the world at the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange (2017 – 2022). Coordinator and author of the SOK training program for Polish language teachers.
Karina Knyż
Accounting and Administrative Director
Natalia Wiaderna
Project Assistant - MHPSS Program
Specialist in web design and organization of online courses, with a passion for foreign languages. Natalia has been working for years with organizations supporting the development of various social and professional groups. In the Learning Passport platform implementation in Poland, she is overseeing the technical and linguistic aspects.
Marta Miklińska
Project Assistant - Polish as a Second Language Program
Project assistant with professional experience in the field of soft HR, project coordination, and employer branding. At the Foundation, she supports the coordination of the Akelius project, which is implemented in collaboration with UNICEF. Whenever she can, she grabs the camera and captures Foundation’s daily activities.
This Could Be You!
Become SOK's Partner
Thanks to our partners we are able to work even more effectively to accomplish even more. If you have an idea for a collaboration or you’d like to come up with one together, contact us. Joining forces makes it possible to make an even greater impact on the world!
Donate today
Your donation will help us organize workshops, buy necessary equipment and products.
Direct transfers
Fundacja Samodzielność od Kuchni
ul. Rejtana 15 lok. B
02–516 Warszawa
KRS 0000718683
NIP 521 381 37 06
Donate in EURO
PL10 1090 1043 0000 0001 5579 0722
BIC: WBKPPLPP