Volunteer with Community Chef

Community Chef is a volunteer leadership development program of Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County (CCE-Tompkins) that aims to support its participants to empower themselves to become agents of change for healthier food in their communities. It provides a foundation of nutrition knowledge, culinary techniques, leadership, community organizing and group facilitation skills for participants to confidently co-facilitate classes with CCE-Tompkins nutrition educators and/or initiate other projects that promote cooking, healthy eating, local foods and food justice for all residents of Tompkins County.

Responsibilities:
Participate in all 8 training sessions (make-up sessions offered as needed). Training includes 7 interactive hands-on sessions in the teaching kitchen at CCE-Tompkins and a field trip/graduation dinner for the final session. Facilitated by CCE-Tompkins educators, volunteer culinary instructors and other community leaders, weekly sessions include food preparation and a shared meal. Topics include a strength-based introduction to leadership, food and community building, cooking well on a budget, accessing locally grown food, cooking together and food safety/food preservation. In addition to taking home a certificate and badge, Community Chefs receive a binder with useful tools for promoting cooking, healthy eating, local foods, food justice and how to access resources for independent projects.

Within six months after graduation, volunteers choose one or both of the following:

Assist CCE-Tompkins nutrition educators with a 6-week nutrition education series. This field experience reinforces concepts from training and provides opportunities for feedback and support. Responsibilities may include helping to recruit participants, attending meetings to plan and prepare for classes and shopping for and setting up classes.

Initiate independentcommunity-based food project(s). Community Chefs may team up with other Community Chefs or CCE-Tompkins educators to coordinate projects with pre-approval and support from the Community Chef Coordinator. Project activities may include:

• Identifying a neighborhood, community center, school, food pantry, soup kitchen, farmer's market or supermarket in which individuals or families would like to participate in food and nutrition classes, cooking cooperatives, food demonstrations or supermarket tours
• Recruiting and following up with participants
• Attending meetings to plan and prepare for classes, cooking cooperatives, demonstrations and/or tours
• Leading classes or cooking cooperatives, setting up and staffing interactive food demonstrations and/or leading supermarket tours using approved curricula or educational based outreach tools provided by Community Chef Coordinator

Additional Recommended Activities:

• Document field experience and independent projects using written or audio narrative, photos or video format.

• Nominate a community member to participate in the next Community Chef series.

Support and Communication:
Throughout the training and for 6 months following graduation, the Community Chef Coordinator will support Community Chefs in their CCE-Tompkins nutrition field experience and/or independent project(s). Communication between Community Chefs, the Community Chef Coordinator and CCE-Tomkins educators is expected to occur in all directions. 

Skills and Qualifications:

• Demonstrated interest in working with groups and teaching
• Demonstrated interest in nutrition, cooking, healthy eating, promoting local food and food justice
• Ability and willingness to travel (on public transportation as needed) with cooking equipment in tow
• Strong organizational and community organizing skills; excellent communication skills
• Demonstrated reliability and follow-through
• Familiarity with networks of people of color and low/moderate income communities in Tompkins County and possession of cultural competencies to build respectful, trusted relationships
• Established relationships with one or more of the following: local schools, community centers, food pantries, soup kitchens, farmers markets, restaurants and/or supermarkets a plus

Benefits:

• Acquire new knowledge and skills shared by food and nutrition community leaders
• Improve your facilitation and leadership skills
• Make new friends and work as a team with others who share similar interests
• Become familiar with food entrepreneurship opportunities
• Gain a personal sense of satisfaction by initiating community food projects
• Receive continued support on independent projects as needed
• Improve the health and wellness of your community via promoting access to healthy, local and safe foods