BCA SkillsUSA’s American Spirit Team Leads Intro to Culinary Class at Annual BCA Flash Event
February 25, 2020
On Saturday, January 25, 2020, the Bergen County Academies held its annual BCA Flash event, teaching middle school students in Bergen County a variety of courses ranging from Robotics to Beginner’s Bookbinding. This year, the Bergen County Academies SkillsUSA Chapter partnered with the Academy for Culinary Arts and Hospitality Administration (ACAHA) to run an introductory course to culinary arts. Two 2-hour sessions were organized in an effort to introduce middle school students to basic food handling and kitchen safety procedures, as well as basic preparations of sweet and savory treats. BCA’s SkillsUSA members first taught a presentation on the kitchen procedures used within our facility, and then provided an introduction to the preparation of french apple tarts and chocolate chip cookies through live demonstrations.
The BCA SkillsUSA American Spirit team, consisting of Bryant Kye, Francesca Mignano, and JJ Pak, spearheaded the event and coordinated the classes, alongside the help of fellow SkillsUSA members and teacher advisers. Culinary instructor, Chef John Branda, supervised the safety presentations and live demonstrations to ensure that the event ran smoothly, while more than 15 SkillsUSA members volunteered their time to aid in pre-preparation and class assistance.
The Intro to Culinary course was a huge success thanks to the participation and commitment of so many dedicated members of ACAHA. Properly presenting the myriad of different skills often practiced in the Culinary Academy in such a short amount of time was quite difficult, but was strongly enforced and emphasized by each student teacher, every step of the process. The great popularity and immensely positive feedback from volunteers, faculty, parents, and participants of the class alike can only mean one thing: the Intro to Culinary course will only return and better than ever!
