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Monday, August 2, 2021-Woodland, WA-Woodland Public Schools’ food services employees Cristina Forgey and Anna Moran developed an educational competition for elementary students to make up for food services events that did not happen during the year due to pandemic restrictions.
During normal years, Woodland’s food services staff holds a variety of educational opportunities throughout the school system including the Fine Dining Event where students learn proper table manners and how to engage their fellow dinner guests during a multi-course luncheon and the Future Chefs Event where students submit their own recipe ideas, cook them, and judges determine a winner.
Unfortunately, due to the social distancing and other limiting restrictions as a result of the pandemic, all food services special events were postponed. However, Cristina Forgey and Anna Moran, school cooks at Columbia Elementary School, cooked up an idea for an essay competition.
An optional exercise, students could write essays at home about a particular topic and then submit their essay to win prizes. “We wanted to inspire our students, so we asked them to write an essay explaining why they want to become a master chef,” said Forgey. “We had 16 students participate which was awesome, however, even more wanted to and didn’t get their essays in by the deadline so we’re hoping to have even more next year.”
Essays were judged by school staff with the winner receiving a variety of cooking utensils along with a cookbook. All participants received a special gift basket including a cooking spoon, healthy snacks, and a participation certificate. In order to make lunchtime exciting for her students, Forgey dresses up in an over-the-top “Lunch Lady” costume, so she wore that costume and delivered the prizes to students during their classes.
The response was so overwhelming that Laura Perry, Woodland’s Director of Nutrition Services, decided to make the event an annual occurrence. “We fully support programs like this where students engage in nutrition, learn about food, and develop skills they will use for the rest of their lives,” she explained. “Many students have never had the opportunity or inspiration to explore cooking, so having events and competitions can go a long way to lighting that spark in a child’s imagination for cooking, baking, or even becoming a professional chef.”
Forgey dedicated the event to Judy Lute, a long-time school chef at Columbia Elementary School who passed away during the school year. “I am determined to live up to the standard she had to provide excellent food service to our kids,” explained Forgey. “We always try to go ‘over-the-top’ in our cafeteria to entertain our kids and give them a place to blow off steam, particularly in these trying times.”
Learn more about how Woodland Public Schools educates our students and serves the community by visiting our dedicated news webpage at www.woodlandschools.org/news/wsd
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