Serving Up Success: Dallas College Program Works To Close the Restaurant Leadership Gender Gap

Oct. 10, 2025

Health care professional and food creative Veronica Ume-Ezeoke wasn’t sure where her passion for food would take her when she signed up for the Women in Restaurants Leadership Program (WRLP) as part of its first cohort in 2023.

The program is built on the belief that equality in the food industry can be achieved by dismantling exclusionary beliefs and normalizing full participation in the workplace. Dallas College adjunct faculty Hanh Ho facilitates WRLP, which provides seminars, training, job shadowing and mentorship opportunities geared toward creating a more positive restaurant culture for women.

Chef Michelle Carpenter, owner of Restaurant Beatrice, first approached Dallas College with the concept. Her goal was to use mentorship to address the gender gap in restaurant leadership. The eight-week WRLP, which was the subject of this news report, is tuition-free and open to anyone wishing to advance in the restaurant industry and support its mission.

For Ume-Ezeoke, the program helped her move from dreamer to business owner.

Veronica Ume-Ezeoke “It gave us tangible hard skills. I think you naturally come into the program with a vision for what it is you want to do. The experience was grounding in the sense that it gives you a financial eye and the staging gives you the real-life experience to test whether or not that vision holds true at the end.”

Through the program, she realized that opening a restaurant was not her immediate next step. Instead, she opened the organic juice and smoothie bar, CNTRD JUICE, on Victory Park Lane in downtown Dallas.

“WRLP extended beyond what you needed to know and created real bonds and relationships — a network,” said Ume-Ezeoke. She connected with local suppliers to forge a more sustainable business model.

Though there is no tuition for WRLP, each session of students supports the program by putting on a pop-up capstone dinner. (Watch a video from at last Spring’s dinner here).

The fundraiser is a five-course gourmet meal where program participants have an opportunity to practice what they’ve learned. This Fall’s event will be held Monday, Nov. 3, 5:30-8 p.m., at Dallas College Culinary, Pastry and Hospitality Center.

Everyone is welcome and tickets can be purchased through this link.

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