In a bustling coffee shop in Narberth, something extraordinary is happening on the Main Line. Behind the counter, adolescents and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and neurodivergent conditions are mastering the art of customer service, learning job skills, and building confidence—one latte at a time.

This is GET Café, the employment training program run by GETincluded. This grassroots nonprofit addresses one of the most pressing challenges facing families of children with disabilities: what happens after age 21, when educational support services end?

GETincluded and GET Café were named as our Community Builder of the Year and Main Line Parent 2025 LOVE Award Winners – Inclusivity Champion thanks to nominations from local parents in our Community who love and trust them:

Why Main Line Families Face the “Cliff at 22” for Adults with Disabilities

“We call it the cliff of 22,” said Brooke Goodspeed, founder of GETincluded. “Kids receive incredible support and thoughtful planning in the school system, but that all falls off after age 21. It’s just not the same.”

The statistics are sobering. For young adults with ADHD, for example, their frontal lobe development can lag years behind their neurotypical peers. 

“Someone might graduate at 22 but cognitively, from a neurodevelopmental perspective, they’re more like a 15-year-old,” Goodspeed said. “There’s this big gap where we ask, ‘What happens to those people?'”

Too often, the answer is a loss of skills and lack of progress — exactly when these young adults need continued growth and development most.

GET Café in Narberth Offers a Different Employment Approach

GET Café operates on a radically different model than traditional vocational rehabilitation programs. Rather than extensive assessments and clinical protocols, they put people to work and teach them on the job. It’s just like everyone else learns.

“We teach through coaching, mentorship, and direct training in the moment and in the natural learning environment,” Goodspeed said. “All of those things happen naturally and organically. We meet people exactly where they are and build on their strengths. They get to practice, learn from mistakes, and try again the next day. There’s this long-term, never-ending growth and development.”

What makes GET Café truly unique is its integration with the broader community. Unlike segregated workshop settings, employees interact daily with customers, creating authentic teaching moments for everyone involved.

“The inclusion piece really happens with the interface of the broader community,” Goodspeed emphasizes. “It’s natural and authentic, and it allows for teaching in the moment with the actual community integrated into the picture.”

GET Café Creates Community Impact Beyond Coffee in Narberth

The impact extends far beyond the employees. Parents regularly approach Goodspeed to share how visits to GET Café spark meaningful conversations with their children about differences, acceptance, and inclusion.

Goodspeed said, “A mom will say, ‘I had this incredible conversation with my 5-year-old after we went to the cash register. We saw someone struggling with communication, and we had the opportunity to model behavior and grace for someone’s learning needs. Then we followed that up with enjoying our coffee and croissant over a really meaningful talk about brain differences, learning differences, kindness and acceptance.’”

Customers consistently return, drawn not just by the quality coffee, but by the authentic atmosphere of growth and learning they witness.

GET Café’s Innovative Mentorship Program Builds Main Line Community

GET Café’s approach to staffing is as thoughtful as its mission. The organization bookends volunteer support with retired professionals, such as  former special education teachers and speech therapists who bring decades of wisdom. Other staff includes teenagers, often siblings of individuals with disabilities, who are given autonomy and leadership opportunities.

“We have this fluidity that happens across the support staff,” Goodspeed said. “The peer mentorship model is particularly powerful, allowing employees to both learn and teach, even while developing their own skills.

“Someone might excel at three different features of employment but struggle in others,” she notes. “Participants can help each other in areas where they’re strong, which actually helps both people learn the skills better. Through this collaborative process, we’re also building social communication skills.”

GET Café’s Employment Success by the Numbers

GET Café’s success is reflected in both its impact and its sustainability. The organization is 80% self-funded through café sales, with only 20% coming from donations. These numbers show that inclusive employment can be economically viable.

Currently employing 34 people in paid positions, GET Café has a waiting list of over 80 individuals seeking opportunities. The demand is constant. 

“Literally every single day I am having to tell people, ‘Let me see, I’m not sure, or probably not for another year,'” Goodspeed says.

Employees earn $10-15 per hour plus tips, working 3–4 hour shifts that accommodate their individual needs and energy levels. But the benefits extend far beyond the paycheck.

Disability Employment Guided by Experts

From day one, GETincluded — the non-profit behind GET Café — has been guided by experts in the field. These include speech therapists, occupational therapists, behavior therapists, and self-advocates. The goal is to translate what works in clinical and educational settings into the employment environment.

“We’re really trying to take what people get in the school system and extend that,” Goodspeed said. “We’re trying to figure out creative ways of extending the expertise, the collaborative spirit, the non-stop learning, the developmental lens, and developmental approach.”

GET Café’s Expansion Plans to Create More Disability Employment

GETincluded plans to expand with corporate catering operations as their next priority. This will create additional job training opportunities in food service and retail.

But growth requires support. As a grassroots nonprofit, every donation goes directly to programming and expansion.

“It’s literally a village doing this,” Goodspeed said. “People are volunteering their time, money, expertise, space, and resources. We need more parents to get involved and support us. Your donations aren’t going through multiple layers of administration or paying salaries—they’re going directly toward what we need to build the next phase of this project.”

Brewing Something Revolutionary, One Cup at a Time

For families facing the uncertainty of life after high school for a child with disabilities, GET Café offers something precious: hope and a proven model for meaningful inclusion.

“We’re demonstrating that you can build employment settings that have nothing to do with traditional waiver services or vocational rehab,” Goodspeed says. “When those standards are removed, we have more freedom to really program in the way we want to — and the way that works.”

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Ready to be part of the solution? Visit GET Café to experience their inclusive model, attend their upcoming events to learn how you can get involved, or donate to help expand opportunities for the 80+ individuals on their waiting list. As Brooke Goodspeed says, ‘It’s literally a village doing this’—and they need more villagers to join the cause.