Clark County Family and Consumer Sciences Extension Agent collaborated with the counselors and FRC at Baker Intermediate School to offer the Recipes for Life Program to 358 fifth-grade students over three days in December of 2023. The Clark County Horticulture, ANR, and 4-H agents also assisted in the implementation of this program. Since all public-school 5^th graders attend Baker, the students were divided into three groups based on their homerooms. Each group, consisting of about 119 students, was then bused on their respective day to the Extension office. Over the 4 hours the students were at the office, they learned important food preparation, kitchen and food safety skills. The FCS agent secured 15-20 volunteers per day that worked with students in a hands-on educational setting to complete 4 recipes throughout the day, practicing the skills they had been taught. Twelve high school beta club students also volunteered each day, washing dishes and plating the finished food for the students to taste what they had prepared. Each student was sent home with the tools and recipe book to practice at home what they learned during the Recipes for Life program.

A pre-test/ post­test evaluation was conducted to determine learning outcomes. As a result of the program, 94% of respondents learned to correctly guide food when using a knife.  Over 80% of respondents reported they knew the correct way to hold a knife on the post-test, whereas only 20% answered correctly on the pre-test. Additionally, 82% of students reported they knew how to safely tell when meat was cooked (by using a meat thermometer), a 50% increase from the pre-test answers. Several students were overheard telling volunteers this was “the best day ever” and the counselors reported that many students went home to make the recipes for their families. One teacher even called to tell the FCS agent that when asking her class what they did over the weekend, 2 students reported making the muffin recipe for their siblings.