A Fremont nonprofit founder has been nationally recognized for her work with Joshua’s Gift. Co-founder Mizpah Brown-Rich is a L’Oréal Paris 2025 Women of Worth honoree.
“It’s more than an award. It’s a recognition for the work that we’re doing,” said Brown-Rich. “But it also belongs to my son Joshua, and, I believe, to every family walking this journey of autism.”
Joshua’s Gift is a Fremont-based nonprofit aimed to defy the social stigma of people with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (IDD) like autism. Their current initiative is called CODE JOSHUA, which trains first responders to recognize people with IDDs and respond with caution. They also organize opportunities for neurodivergent people to go out in public with their families, including to Warriors games.
“A lot of the families that we serve are disenfranchised, they are families that come from underprivileged communities,” Brown-Rich said. “There are so many resources that are needed. And Joshua’s Gift is one of the nonprofits in the Bay Area that really supports families socially.”
The Women of Worth program is celebrating its 20th year. The makeup, hair and skincare brand chooses 10 honorees to highlight on all their media channels, including their website, Instagram and Facebook. The Women of Worth staff chose honorees who make a great impact in their nonprofit work.
Photos courtesy of L’Oréal Paris
“Honestly it’s surreal, I’m still overwhelmed with gratitude, it’s incredible,” said Brown-Rich. “Being chosen as a 2025 L’Oreal Paris Women’s Worth Honoree is truly humbling.”
The honorees not only get to use a global platform to share their organization’s mission, they also get mentorship from the L’Oréal team and $25,000 in funding. Brown-Rich said she plans to spend the funding on training for CODE JOSHUA.
“It’s definitely going towards what we already do…we have our CODE JOSHUA program which is our main initiative right now,” she said. “We provide trainings for first responders with strong emphasis specifically on law enforcement. And it’s specialized training that helps them recognize and appropriately respond to individuals on the autism spectrum during crisis.”
She was able to meet the nine other honorees to learn more about nonprofit outreach. “The team and everyone at L’Oréal Paris, Women of Worth, have just embraced us and provided so many opportunities now for us too,” Brown-Rich said, “and a pathway for us to really be successful in pursuing and continuing to elevate our cause, which inevitably supports the families that we love so dearly that are living with autism and intellectual developmental disabilities.”
She said she’s very grateful for the mentorship opportunity. “It’s extremely important to all of us as honorees because learning from visionary women and leaders who have created change is just going to help strengthen our foundation’s impact and the structure of our foundation. I plan to take all those insights and apply them towards building stronger partnerships.”
