Make Your Mark in 2026

Join your fellow Women in Business for an energizing gathering and discussion about making our mark in the New Year.  Activate your inner creator with a fun block-printing activity, and learn more about the art of linocutting with our expert session leaders at Schoolhouse Kitchen + Studio.

Meet our Speakers: 

Cheryl Knecht is the Founder and Owner of Schoolhouse Kitchen + Studio. It’s her dream job.

To experience more meaningful connections to her local farmers and neighbors, she opened (along with hundreds of others) a cooperative grocery store in the Village of Oak Park, IL in July 2015 called Sugar Beet Food Co-op. The Co-op celebrates community and good food by providing a full-service marketplace for local vendors and producers and greater access to local, organic food. Her passion for education and skill-sharing motivated her to establish an educational organization which became Sugar Beet Schoolhouse.

In 2016 Cheryl found a home for the Schoolhouse (we just call it Schoolhouse now) in a sweet little building in River Forest that includes a commercial kitchen for community chefs that she also manages (River Forest Kitchen) and a greenhouse. Cheryl received the Golden Beet Award from the Illinois Stewardship Alliance for Community Food Development in 2015 and has been named to New City Chicago’s “Big Heat” list of Chicago’s “movers and shakers” in the Chicago food scene three times.

Cheryl enjoys hiking and biking, listening to audiobooks and LOVES sharing her passion with others. Cheryl lives in Oak Park, IL with her loveable teenagers, Cedar and Ren, and their majestic black cat, MO.

Sarah Edgar 

Sarah has worked at The Schoolhouse since 2021. She loves tackling new recipes and techniques, and her favorite things to bake are mirror glaze mousse cakes, macarons and cute Kawaii treats. Sarah is delighted to share her love of baking and cooking with children! She loves to encourage kids to keep trying, even if it doesn’t come out perfectly the first time. She lives with her husband, two children, cats and chickens in Oak Park.