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Heating Things Up
The 2004 Michigan ProStart® Student Competition, which was held at the Amway Grand Plaza, Grand Rapids, on Monday, March 8 and Tuesday, March 9, 2004, was a huge success.
Students from 14 different schools gathered to compete in either the Culinary Competition or the Management Competition, or both. During this two-day event, the students attended a chef demonstration from the Amway’s very own pastry chefs, Chef Doug Orr and Chef Scott Hunter. The students were also given backhouse tours of the Amway Grand Plaza.
The Culinary Competition, sponsored by SYSCO Companies of Michigan, consisted of 13 schools battling it out to see who was the best of the best. The students were under pressure as their meal, consisting of an entrée, salad and dessert had to be completed in 60 minutes or less. Not only were they on a time limit, they were only allowed to use two butene burner stoves. No other cooking equipment was allowed. The students worked as a team to make sure that everyone was in the right place at the right time in their 10’x 10’ work area.
The pressure was also on for our twelve culinary judges, who had to evaluate the teams in areas such as Work Skills, Team Skills, Safety and Sanitation, Product Taste, Finished Product and Menu and Recipe Presentation. Lead Judge, Randy Emert, Great Oaks Country Club, did a great job in securing all of the culinary judges and keeping them on task.
While the teams met with the Culinary Judges, staff was busy tabulating all of the scores. Bob Yaeger, Senior V.P. of Sales for SYSCO of Grand Rapids was proud to present the awards to the 3 winners of the Culinary Competition. The third place winner was River Valley High School, second place winner was Fruitport High School and the first place winner of the Culinary Competition was Plymouth Centennial Educational Park.
The Management Competition, sponsored by Gordon Food Service, consisted of two separate categories: Case Study and Knowledge Bowl. The Case Study portion of the Management Competition was a team event in which students were supplied with a scenario, given thirty minutes to discuss how they would solve the scenario, and 10 minutes to present it to the judges. The students worked as a team, taking on different roles of the hospitality industry, such as General Manager, Food and Beverage Manager and Catering Manager. In their presentation to the judges, the students stated how they would solve the scenario under the role that they were given.
The Knowledge Bowl portion of the Management Competition is where teams demon-strated their knowledge of the hospitality industry by competing in a question and answer "Quiz Bowl" format. Each of the seven participating schools competed twice, against a different team each time.
Combining the possible 40 points of the Case Study to the possible 60 points of the Knowledge Bowl created the 100 points needed for the Management Competition. Lead Judge, Barrie Borovsky, MGM Grand-Detroit worked tirelessly to create the Case Study scenario and scoring sheets. He was on the scene during each round to check on the students and the six judges and took charge of personally reviewing each team’s scores.
Students waited patiently during the hour prior to the awards ceremony while tabulating of all scores was taking place. Dan Robertson, Gordon Food Service, was honored to present the awards to the winning teams of the Management Competition. The third place winner was Branch Area Career Center, second place winner was Mason Lake ISD and the first place winner of the Management Competition was Calhoun Area Tech Center.
Plymouth Centennial Educational Park and Calhoun Area Tech Center will represent Michigan at the 2004 National ProStart Student Invitational held April 25-27 th in Orlando, Florida.
Patti Kenworthy, 2002-2003 Teacher of the Year had the honor of presenting the 2003-2004 Teacher of the Year award to Michal Wheeler, Fruitport High School. Michal Wheeler has taught for Grand Rapids Public and Fennville Public and has been at Fruitport High School for the last 13 years. She has been involved with ProStart and the MRA for the past 3 years. Michal was selected as the Teacher of the Year through a ballot that was distributed to her peers. Michal received a Knife Kit from Grand Rapids Community College, a trip to the National Restaurant Association Show in Chicago, a weekend trip to the Johnson & Wales Denver, CO campus from Johnson & Wales and a trophy from the Michigan Restaurant Association Educational Support Foundation.
A special thanks goes out to the staff at the Amway Grand Plaza, the MRA staff, and to all of our sponsors, especially SYSCO Companies of Michigan for sponsoring the Culinary Competition and Gordon Food Services for sponsoring the Management Competition.
For additional information about the ProStart Competition, contact Education Director Stacy Gonda at 800-968-9668 ext 3927 or at sgonda@mramail.org.
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| CULINARY JUDGES |
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Jeff Ales, CEC, Canterbury on the Lake |
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Tom Brann, Brann's Steakhouse |
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Randy Emert, CEC, Great Oaks Country Club |
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Liz Hanson, Sysco of Grand Rapids |
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Ray Hollingsworth, CEC, Best Western Sterling Inn |
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Kristin Jablonski, Kaleidoscope Pastries/Washtenaw Community College |
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Julia Nelson, Culinary Institute of America |
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Sean O'Rourke, CCC, O'Rourke on Fire/Michigan Cuisine Catering |
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Brian Polcyn, CEC, Five Lakes Grill |
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Randy Sahajdack, CFE, Grand Rapids Community College |
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Mike Trombley, CEC, Barton Hills Country Club |
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Jeffery Wolf, Macomb Community College |
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John Zehnder, CEC, AAC, Zehnder's Restaurant |
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| MANAGEMENT JUDGES |
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Barrie Borovsky, MGM Grand |
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Barbara Franks, Johnson & Wales |
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Bob Fish, Beaner's Gourmet Coffee |
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Jim Marovec, FMP, NRA ESF |
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Dan Robertson, Gordon Food Service |
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Frank Taylor, Sweet Georgia Brown |
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Chris Woodruff, Eastern Michigan University |
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