At LIFT Enrichment, we know that the thought of signing your school up for an afterschool cooking program can sometimes feel the same way.
Will it all work out?
What will the parents think?
Will the teachers like it?
Who will be the chef teacher?
And that’s why we do a series called, “Meet the Chef,” where you can get to know our Chef Teachers before you see them in the classroom, (and hopefully convince you that you’re in very good hands.
Today?
We’re meeting Sundra Hanna, a “wife, mother, and encourager”, who loves life and people, and has been in love with cooking since she was 2 years old.
Cooking with grandma
Born in Louisiana, Chef Sundra calls herself a “true Southern girl”, who’s loved cooking for as long as she can remember. Probably, she says, as a result of spending so much time in the kitchen watching her grandmother.
As she explained,
“I have been in the kitchen since I was 2 years old.
My grandmother would sit me on a stool in the kitchen with her while she cooked.
Everything I learned about preparing meals was from my mother and grandmother.”
Enjoying cooking at such an early age, Sundra went on to take gourmet cooking classes in elementary and high school and was cooking her first full-course meals at age 12!
Sharing her love of cooking and teaching
As an adult, Sundra worked in the public sector, but in October 2022, she made a bold move to quit her job in order to make space for her two passions:
Cooking and teaching.
“Really,” she explained, “I just wanted to do something that I loved, that was more rewarding, and where I felt like I was making a difference in someone’s life every day. So, when I started working with Lift Enrichment in March of 2023 as a chef teacher, I knew that a change is gonna come. Cooking is my passion, and teaching is something I love; the fact that I can combine them both in this job is a total win!”
What cooking means for her
For Sundra, cooking is something that comes from the heart:
“Cooking to me is just another way of showing
and spreading love.”
She goes on:
“Being a chef teacher is a combination of my love of cooking and my love of sharing. I get to use cooking skills and techniques that were taught to me as a little girl in Louisiana in the kitchen with my mom and grandmother, whom I affectionately called Madea.”
Passing on wisdom with each recipe
As she watched her grandmother cook, Sundra realized she wasn’t just getting cooking lessons. She was getting life lessons too, with all the stories and wisdom her grandmother shared with her.
And now that Sundra’s the one doing the cooking?
She tries to do the same for her students too.
“When I’m teaching,” she told us, “I get to drop little nuggets of wisdom with each recipe. It reminds me of being that little girl my grandmother would sit on that tall stool in the kitchen with her, while she cooked. With each moment and each dish, she would drop those nuggets of wisdom in me that I now can remember and share. Now I get to “pay it forward” by teaching my students with love, a smile, and gratitude the same way I was taught.”
Here are a few of her favorite “nuggets” she shares:
- ‘Each One Teach One.’
This is an African proverb that emphasizes the importance of sharing knowledge and skills. I learned my love and knowledge of cooking from my mother and grandmother; teaching with Lift enrichment allows me to share my skills and knowledge of cooking, preparing meals, and using different techniques of cooking with our students.
- ‘Teamwork makes the dream work’.
I quote this in each class to remind students that when we all work together, “we get it done,’ and it’s a ‘win-win’.
- ‘Pay it forward’.
When you receive, you should give. Pay it forward, whether it’s a skill, service, or a positive word.
- ‘You don’t have to like it, you just have to try it’.
This is what I tell my students in each class. The trick is, most of the time when you try something new, you will like it. But if you never try it, you’ll never know if you like it or not.
A Child Learns What They Live
In 1954, Dorothy Law Nolte, a parent educator, family counselor, and writer – wrote a poem called, “A Child Learns What They Live.” In a few years, it was pinned to fridge doors across the land because of its simple message:
Our children become what we teach them to be.
The poem is something that’s stayed with Sundra, and shapes how she teaches in the classroom. As she explains,
“I try to make sure every child that I cross paths with has a positive experience to remember. I believe all children should have happy memories. Working with Lift gives me the opportunity to create some of those happy memories for them and doing so for me is very rewarding.”
And if children learn to cook?
Well…
We’ll leave that last line up to you. 🙂
Speaking of which…
If you’d like to learn more about how an afterschool cooking program would work for your school, along with the government grants available to fund it, you can book a free call with one of our team by clicking the link below:
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