INDUSTRY CHAMPIONS The Essential Role Of Industry Mentors For High School Culinary Classrooms
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he Oregon Hospitality Foundation (OHF), in conjunction with the Oregon Restaurant & Lodging Association, supports a career technical education program called ProStart. This national curriculum is available to all schools in Oregon interested in growing their culinary and restaurant management programming for high school students. The Foundation is fortunate to work with many hospitality industry mentors integrated with this program. We talk with four of these mentors who share their remarkable stories about how they got involved with ProStart and continue to inspire our students to jump into the hospitality industry as students and following high school. Take a moment to read about their experiences, and if you’re interested, hear more about how to get involved with ProStart by contacting Courtney Smith, Oregon ProStart Liaison, at CSmith@OregonRLA.org. “One person can make a difference, and everyone should try.” - John F. Kennedy JOSH ARCHIBALD Executive Chef, Tillamook Creamery Mentor, Seaside High School OHF: What motivated you to get involved as a ProStart mentor? Archibald: I was drawn to the program for a few different reasons. I actually graduated from Seaside High School in 1999. I took a simple Home Economics class, but no further food education or hospitality courses were offered at the time. I went on to continue cooking and eventually attend culinary school, but if I had the opportunity to be exposed to a program like ProStart, it would have provided better guidance in my own career path. From an operations standpoint, we were wise enough to recognize the need for skilled restaurant labor in our local community far ahead of the curve. We knew that investing in the program and its students would be not only beneficial to our own operations, but perhaps
Seaside High School ProStart Student Competitors
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Oregon Restaurant & Lodging Association | SPRING 2022
even the restaurant community in our tourism-based, beach economy. While that was absolutely part of the decision to support the program, it also goes along with the fundamentals of cooking for a living, and we’re able to provide opportunities to teach the next generation of culinarians. One of the most valuable things about the program is that even if a student decided to pursue another career path, the lessons it teaches are good life skills that are important for a life of feeding themselves, and the people they love. OHF: What value can someone from the restaurant industry bring to the classroom? Archibald: I think by having access to industry experts, students can see the vast opportunities available to them in our field. At their impressionable age many think of the hospitality industry as just a hotel or pizza shop. While there is nothing wrong with that, they haven’t been exposed to much beyond their local community. Access to industry experts helps them understand our industry better, and the broad career paths offered within the field of hospitality–whether that means food stylist photographer or cruise ship concierge and all of the in-betweens. As an industry, our possibilities are endless, and giving students a glimpse into that can have huge benefits. OHF: What experience do you have of hiring ProStart students? Archibald: We were fortunate, especially in the years of our backto-back state championships, to have great success in not only hiring, but retaining some of our students. It was a great way for us to source colleagues that we already had a relationship with, and in turn, who already knew us and our expectations. The timing of the tourism “season” works really well for their seasonal employment, and if they returned to the program in following years those students were already showing vast improvement in knowledge and leadership skills and became even larger assets to the program. As an industry this program can be one of our greatest solutions to continued workforce struggles as it allows us to teach, inspire, and cultivate the people that will run this industry in the future. CHEF MICHAEL THIEME Mentor, North Eugene High School OHF: What were you able to bring to the classroom as an industry member? Thieme: I bring my knowledge and experience. I’ve been a mentor working with Miho (ProStart instructor) for 19 years. And even when we weren’t in the competition, we still worked with the students on development of their skills. It’s kind of like, when we're in the classroom and we're preparing for a competition, it's more than just a competition. It’s also about how you market yourself and get your resume built. I try to get the students to do their part. It's their competition and so they need to create it and they need to build it– I just guide them and tell them where I think things are good and
