Our summer Culinary Job Training graduation ceremony featured all the fantastic moments that make these seasonal graduation days four of the best days of the year. But this one marking our 180th graduating class was extra special, with a ceremonial resolution from the DC Council honoring DC Central Kitchen and a reunion of CJT alumni.
The celebratory and familial tone was set by graduate speaker Vernon McRae of CJT Class 132. “More than 2,500 alumni have completed the CJT program with DC Central Kitchen. Let that set in. More than 2,500 people needed a second, third, or even fourth chance at life. Substance abuse, housing instability, people who have had doors slammed in their faces time after time, one door remained open for all of us, and that was DC Central Kitchen.” Vernon told his story of finding DC Central Kitchen, coming to our program as a returning citizen, and stepping up as a father. He relayed experiences of graduating from the CJT program on a Friday and beginning work as a full-time DC Central Kitchen Guest Experience Guide the following Monday, charged with leading tours of our brand-new headquarters and welcoming dozens of volunteers each day. He thrived at work and at home, moving up to Guest Experiences Lead, earning the Dorothy Bell Award, getting his own place, and gaining custody of his son. “I learned how to stop making excuses and start making adjustments.” McRae ended with remarks with a nod to DC Central Kitchen founder Robert Egger’s ‘relentless incrementalism’ motto. That motto was on full display later in the day.
Following Vernon was another familiar face to the Kitchen, Capital City Mambo Sauce founder and chief executive Arsha Jones. A major DC entrepreneurial success story, Jones volunteered with Class 180 as a guest speaker and judge of a special mambo sauce-centered student cooking competition! Jones also regularly donates her company’s products to anti-hunger programs like DC Central Kitchen and DC Food Project. “For decades, this organization has been creating opportunities, changing lives, and helping people build new futures,” said Arsha. “And now your names are part of that story. That’s something that nobody can ever take away from you.”
One of the most powerful and uplifting speakers of the day was Class 180’s designated speaker Elijah F., who spoke about his journey from being a young person involved with the justice system to thriving in his new position at a bustling downtown Bib Gourmand-awarded restaurant.
Like a lot of eventual CJT alumni, Elijah wasn’t ready to join the Kitchen when he first found out about DCCK. But he understood that repeating past choices would not lead to better results, and eventually decided to find a new application for his evident talents in the culinary arts and in working with people. “Is this really what my life has become?” he asked himself. “I knew I was meant for something more than cycles that led nowhere. In a moment of uncertainty, I remembered that DC Central Kitchen, an opportunity I had once reached out for but couldn’t fully step into. This time I came prepared, not just with hope, but with the means and mindset to follow through. When I received my acceptance letter [into the CJT program], it felt everything I had been through pointed me towards something purposeful. What I found exceeded every expectation.”
The event concluded with a call to action from DC Central Kitchen CEO Mike Curtin. “Let us recognize today’s graduates and the 2,500 alumni of this program for what they are. Not simply culinary professionals, though they are that. Not simply proud graduates of a program that tested them mentally, physically, and emotionally, though they passed those tests with grace and skill. But as the type of leaders our community needs now more than ever. As people who believe in themselves, this city, and our shared future, and who embody the honesty, humility, and willingness to learn that are the true markers of success.”
Those leaders then headed to the stage for a historic photo. Culinary Job Training program alumni from the first 36 years of the program gathered to celebrate the accomplishments of Class 180 and their own. It was wonderful opportunity to look back and an even better reminder of the power of humility, relentless incrementalism, and, like Elijah, the willingness to do a ‘180’ when the time for positive change is at hand.
