William Neuheisel

Culinary Job Training Students learn French cuisine at DC Central Kitchen

I was at a party this weekend when I met a friend-of-a-friend who does fundraising at an anti-hunger policy organization here in town. He was already familiar with DC Central Kitchen, and so we started talking about some of our newer initiatives, like our recent contract to provide school meals to 7 DC Public Schools.

I mentioned how cool it is that we are now able to hire several more graduates of our culinary job training program to prepare the meals on-site. His comment was that it must also present a challenging messaging problem for us—that people might respond badly to ex-convicts or ex-addicts being hired to cook for schools.

It’s a fair point. A lot of people start to get nervous when you mention the possibility that an ex-con or ex-addict might be cooking at a restaurant they would eat at, not to mention cooking in schools.

But to me, the issue was framed wrong. As stated, the focus of concern is that our nonprofit would have difficulty raising funds for ourselves.

The end of this line of thinking is that it would be easier to raise money if we glossed over this discussion. But the discussion of this issue is not incidental to our fundraising; it is central to our mission. The real problem is that our society can’t find ways to reintegrate people.

In order for us to make meaningful change, we have to challenge the stereotypes and assumptions (some silly and some more legitimate) that serve as hurdles to reintegrating people into our communities.

It is understandable to categorize ex-convicts as more dangerous and less trustworthy than the general population. The problem is that we have a huge blindspot. We see the inherent problem with placing these men and women in jobs at schools, but we fail to see where they would be otherwise.

If we fail to provide opportunities to get counseling and training and find good work, what do you think these people will resort to? And where?

They will go back to what they’ve always done. On the same streets where our children walk to and from school. They will not be magically isolated from children if we simply refuse them these jobs.

I’m not saying we should blindly trust anyone, but we do need to provide opportunities for these people to earn back a place in our workforce. We must find effective ways to train them, vet them, hire them, and trust them.

This discussion is one that I very much want to have. It’s an opportunity to change an entrenched social problem. It’s part of our organization’s most vital work. It’s why I love working in nonprofit communications and fundraising in the first place.