Graduation Day

Friday was graduation day for 8 students in our Community Kitchen program. CK is a very special program here at St Mary's. While all of our other programs involve the distribution of food to individuals, families and agency partners, CK is all about helping an individual get a fresh start. The 14 week curriculum spends half the time on foodservice kitchen skills and the other half on life skills. We firmly believe it is the life skills portion which helps our students truly change their lives. It gives them the skills to cope more effectively with handling money, dealing with stressful situations, improving their interpersonal communication skills and managing their schedules. All of these classes are designed to help insure their success once they are given the opportunity to make a livable wage plus health benefits. The challenges they battle on a daily basis outside the program are as difficult as the classroom and kitchen instruction modules. Almost a third of the students who have gone through the program in the last year were homeless. They were either living in transitional housing, a shelter or temporarily bunking with a friend. Imagine yourself trying to get through a 14 week program unsure about the roof over your head and on top of that 30% of our students are single parents.

The real gratifying part of Community Kitchen is more than 90% of our graduating students are working in foodservice positions a year after graduation and many have already been promoted into high level jobs.......we are changing lives with this program.