Some students come to Pacific with a love for cooking and the Cooking at College program would like to help facilitate that passion. By collecting cooking supplies and hosting cooking events, the founders of the Cooking at College program are giving college meals a whole knew meaning.
“We wanted to create another meal option for students who can’t make the RFOC dining hours or who don’t want to eat at the campus dining areas in the UC,” said coordinator Ian Nicolas.
This year, Nicolas, a sophomore, along with several other classmates started the Cooking at College project for their Ethics and Civic Engagement class. They began by advertising to the community and faculty members to collect cooking supplies. So far, the group has had 15 donations from the local community and some donations from as far as East Portland.
“We have a substantial amount of cooking supplies already,” said Nicolas, “but we are still taking donations,” said Nicolas.
The group has worked with Student Life Director Lisa Geraci on this project. Geraci helps the students on campus who have food allergies to try to make it easier for them to cook on campus.
Nicolas said the goal of Cooking at College is to put the cooking supplies in the Walter and Clark kitchen cupboards where they would have a key code access to insure nothing was stolen. Students would be able to sign up for the program by filling out a cooking supply usage agreement with their resident assistants.
“Hopefully this system will be useful enough in Walter and Clark that other dorm buildings adopt the idea also,” said Nicolas.
The Cooking at College group hopes to develop this into a system that can benefit off-campus students as well.
They want to collect enough supplies so off-campus students can rent them from a center location, such as the PIC, and return them at the end of the school year.
On Thursdays, Cooking at College has been hosting themed cooking events in the Clark kitchen.
“We advertise for them in the residence halls and the UC,” said Nicolas. “It’s open to anyone who wants to come.”
The Cooking at College group plans to establish a Cooking Club by the end of this semester.
If you are interested in donating or would like to know more about this group, email them at Cooking.at.college.pacificu@gmail.com.
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