Min Kim

Program Coordinator
Family League of Baltimore

Through the Family League of Baltimore, Min Kim has been instrumental in launching a program that helps Baltimore mothers and families cope with grief following the death of an infant or unborn baby.

The program, the HOPE Project (Healing Ourselves through Peer Empowerment), is a peer-based home visiting program based at Roberta’s House, a nonprofit center that offers free grief and bereavement services to low-income families in Baltimore City. Kim, a Baltimore native and graduate student in health science at Towson University, established the program’s policies and procedures and helps train the home visitors, who are mothers who have also experienced a loss.

“Every year in Baltimore City, there are approximately 200 fetal and infant deaths, and mothers and families are left unsupported to grieve alone,” Kim said. “HOPE Project is a healing experience for the home visitors and mothers.”

So far, the program has provided in-home support for about 20 mothers and there are plans to reach more. “This has shown us how a community has the capacity to heal itself,” Kim said. “We hope this program serves as a model for other communities in Maryland and across the country.”

Kim is a volunteer with Safe House of Hope and a past volunteer with the American Heart Association and Planned Parenthood.