Chocolate Potlucks and Other Adventures

Yesterday was a great day at school.  We had a chocolate potluck day.  There's always that fear that we won't have enough food, although for an event like this, we're not serving a meal--it would be enough if everyone just had a taste.  I  brought a Mississippi Mud cake to share. It's the heaviest cake I've ever made, dense and sweet as a recipe that hails from the 1970's should be. I cut it into very small pieces, since I knew it may be a bit much for modern palates.

We had 5 batches of brownies--every single brownie devoured.  Half of my Mississippi Mud cake was left, along with some cookies--we saved those for the evening students. I have heard that they feel left out of these events, so I've been trying to remember to include them.

And as they arrived to class, they seemed pleased, although I'm not sure they realized that a chocolate potluck was planned for the day.

I'm calling this event a success!

I'll post the recipe later, in case you want to make one for yourself or for someone you know who needs to put on weight.

I also had a chance to talk with people about other ideas I've had.  I'm still working with the idea of a food pantry or bags of food that they can get.  One of our instructors just had her father die, and he was the kind of man who stocked up on lots of canned goods, the kind of food that the instructor and her daughter aren't likely to eat, like ravioli or vegetables.  When she's ready to sort them, we'll talk more about starting a food bag initiative.

I talked to a student who wanted a copy of his schedule.  I noticed that he had an odd-for-our-students with a class Tuesday morning and a class Tuesday night.  He said that he'd had some issues with his car, and he would be more likely to make it to class if he could keep it all on one day.  I'd been thinking about a ride share board, and he and I talked about whether or not it could work.

I had worried that students might take advantage of each other, by charging too much to share a ride.  But we agreed that students are adults who won't have to accept terms and conditions if they don't like them.  We agreed that there's risk of an accident, but they'd have that risk with Uber or Lift.  I didn't tell him about my fear that someone might be driven somewhere and attacked, but I do worry about that.

So at today's management team meeting, I'll bring it up.  We have extra bulletin boards--it wouldn't take much to launch this idea.

I like being at a place that's small, where I can actually do activities to make the school better and to keep the students feeling more connected.  I feel very lucky.