Vetri Cooking Lab had a year of tremendous growth, expanding from 23 cooking lab sites each semester to 32 this year! This expansion also included the addition of brand new audiences.
Of note is our new partnership with the Achieving Independence Center (AIC) in North Philly – here we host VCL for youth ages 15-20 within the foster care system that will soon be living on their own. This is exciting because the youth are building life skills, confidence in the kitchen, and knowledge that will help them make informed decisions around purchasing, cooking, and eating food!
We also launched programming at our first high school – Liguori Academy in Kensington. This expansion has allowed us to dive deeper into our conversations around food and expand our recipes to challenge an older audience which has more agency over their food decisions.
“I like getting to learn more about cooking because my New Year’s Resolution was to learn how to do it on my own. I’m also happy that it was healthy foods because it taught me that not everything has to be loaded with sugar for me to like it.”
-Jay, 11th Grader at AIC
