Students in Maria Schatz’s Advanced Floral Design are getting real-world experience by creating floral designs that Meridian staff can purchase.
The monthly floral club is a five-month subscription of flower arrangements created by the Advanced Floral Design class. The subscription costs $75 for five months which ends up costing $15 for each arrangement.
“This provides students additional designing experience while providing community members a good product at a great price,” said teacher Maria Schatz.
Students process flowers, build the arrangements, write thank you cards and deliver the finished products. Students also price out arrangements so they can learn markup, labor costs and how much an arrangement would be sold for.
“The monthly flower club subscriptions are important because it teaches students customer service and teaches them to work hard and have pride in their work,” Schatz said.
Schatz explained her goal is for students to learn employable design skills that they could use in a floral shop or any profession. At the end of the course, students have the opportunity to earn a Principles of Floral Design Certificate through iCEV.
Floral design is not the only opportunity students have to learn employable skills. Students in Tami Scott’s classes are learning valuable culinary skills.
At Meridian High School students can enroll in Introduction to Foods and Nutrition, Culinary Arts or Baking and Pastry.
“Everyone eats and for the vast majority of us, at some point in our lives, we’ll all need to cook for ourselves at the very least,” Scott said.
Through these classes students have the opportunity to showcase their skills through a variety of events.
“Catering requests vary quite a bit from year to year and are not limited to desserts, though we do get a fair amount of those!” said Scott.
Catering events from recent years have included senior presentation luncheon desserts, Booster Club craft fair, seniors evening of excellence refreshments, staff workday meals and more.
Students work in teams, have to manage their time and follow state and local regulations for safety and sanitation.
“These are all good skills that will serve them in any occupational field,” Scott said. “Reading and preparing a recipe is simply a great way to practice reading and following directions, a life skill, and you get to eat your results!”
Scott is always looking for new opportunities for her students to further their skills and experience. She organizes a variety of after-school activities for the Trojan Café club. This past March, Meridian High School hosted a county-wide cupcake competition.
Scott said she hopes her students build their confidence and develop a sense of adventure.
“Confident of basic skills in the kitchen and knowing that they can fend for themselves, and that they have a foundation to build on and continue learning,” Scott said. “A sense of adventure to try new foods and new recipes so that it never gets boring! In our world today, we have access to foods and recipes from all over the world!”
Scott is always looking for community members to provide industry insights to students through an advisory committee. Members attend three meetings a year and discuss how to enrich students’ experiences in and outside of the classroom. Interested community members can reach Tami Scott at tscott@meridian.wednet.edu to learn more.