ABERDEEN, S.D. – Once a week during the fall, Aberdeen Central staff and students can grab lunch from a student-run restaurant in the CHS culinary arts kitchen.
It’s all part of the hands-on learning offered in Renae Borchard’s ProStart course, named for a well-known curriculum in the culinary arts industry.
“The kids pick the menu, run the restaurant and everything one day a week,” explained Borchard, CHS Family and Consumer Science Teacher.
Students create tasty homemade lunches, including pasta alfredo, chicken bacon ranch wraps, fried rice and egg rolls, and Swedish meatballs.
“We try to do it from scratch, and this year we got to harvest from the garden over at the greenhouse,” Borchard said.
Along with gaining cooking skills, the students also learn the business side of running a restaurant. They get everything organized, determine the cost of the meal and what the profit was, Borchard said.
Central sophomore Kylie Herman is one of those students—but the CHS restaurant wasn’t her first time gaining industry experience. Outside of school, Herman works as a baker at Moccasin Creek Country Club.
Herman plans to attend culinary school after high school, and possibly open her own bakery one day. At Central, she has taken every cooking course available and said the hands-on classes have helped her get a glimpse of all aspects of the industry.
“I really like the hands-on learning,” Herman said. “I feel like I learn the best.”
Hands-on learning is an important part of all career and technical education classes at CHS. While most CTE classes are taught in the ATEC building, Borchard teaches out of the Culinary Arts Kitchen inside Central.
With CTE classes, students are learning how to be a good employee and work well with others.
“Those are employability skills that you just really can’t get from a traditional classroom,” Borchard said.
Next year, Borchard will offer a ProStart 2 course, which will allow students to compete in a state culinary competition for the first time in several years. The spring competition involves two categories: a “Shark Tank”-like business category where students present a restaurant concept, and a culinary competition where students cook four dishes.
Next year will also mark the return of chef mentors from the community, including Chef Jacob Collins, General Manager at Three22 Kitchen + Cocktails of Aberdeen.
Collins said when the program started, he visited the ProStart class and did demos and Q&A sessions.
“I started going in once a week and worked with the class on different dishes and projects,” Collins said. “We ran a cafe on certain days for the school staff and community partners. I also coached the ProStart competition team for three years.”
Collins said he’s had several students who have gone through the ProStart program that have worked for him. A couple of them have gone on to culinary school, and one is now running his own business.
“I believe this kind of hands-on training is a good way students can truly understand what it means to operate in a restaurant setting before they actually go out into the workforce,” Collins said. “It is equally beneficial to some of the students to realize food service might not be for them. Students that end up competing in competition learn how to work under pressure and under time restraints, both as a team and individually. They have to finish and turn in plates that are judged on visual, taste and uniqueness. This is very important in our industry as restaurants are judged every day on all of those items.”
About the Aberdeen Public School District
The Aberdeen Public School District provides a comprehensive educational program to approximately 4,200 students in grades K-12, with a mission of empowering all students to succeed in a changing world. Our students receive the knowledge and skills necessary to reach their potential in a global community through high expectations of academic achievement; diverse educational opportunities; and community involvement in a safe, supportive environment. Learn more at aberdeen.k12.sd.us.