The DC Central Kitchen

Healthy school foods: dcck provides healthy breakfasts, lunches, and suppers to twelve public schools and six charter and private schools in Washington, d.cDC.c. This service aims to bring local, seasonable and sustainable cost-effective dining service to local schools that want to serve healthy, locally source meals to low-income student populations. In addition to promoting access to good nutrition, The program creates and sustains employment opportunities for at-risk men and women who have completed dcck's culinary job training program. This program served more than 1,030,00 meals to food insecure children during The last fiscal year.

Cafes & catering: dcck creates job and internship opportunities for individuals facing barriers to employment through these social enterprise activities. Since 2019, dcck's cafe in ward 8 has also hosted on-the-job training services for opportunity youth while providing a dignified food access point and community gathering space in an underserved neighborhood. In 2022, dcck opened a second cafe in The flagship location of DC public library, expanding this program's ability to hire dcck culinary graduates, host dcck culinary interns, and support local farm purchasing. In 2023, dcck opened its third cafe in our new sw DC headquarters, allowing us to hire more graduates and host more interns.

Community meals: dcck prepared, served, and delivered more than 1,022,000 meals to front-line shelters, youth programs, and community-based organizations serving food insecure and other vulnerable populations. The program also provided healthy groceries to partner agencies and food insecure individuals, equivalent to an additional 151,000 meals.

Workforce development: dcck operates an intense, nationally recognized twelve-week culinary job training program for adults who have experienced barriers to employment such as histories of incarceration, addiction, homelessness, and trauma. The program offers comprehensive training in culinary arts and food safety and sanitation in combination with job readiness and life skills training. This program operated continuously throughout The past fiscal year, producing 79 graduates across 6 classes, more than 85% of whom secured full-time employment upon graduation.

Healthy corners: dcck offers an affordable wholesale delivery service for fresh produce and healthy snack items in communities where healthy retail options are scarce. Dcck delivers nutritious options to 53 corner stores and other small retailers, primarily those located in The underserved neighborhoods of wards 5, 7, and 8. We provide these small businesses with discounted healthy food items, free infrastructure, nutrition education, marketing support, and technical assistance. Our participating retailers sold more than 395,000 units of healthy food in The last fiscal year.

Impact & evaluation: this department is responsible for dcck's program evaluation activities, cross-cutting case management and clinical services, and management of external, community-facing partnerships with peer nonprofit organizations. Core functions include collecting and analyzing participant feedback and outcomes, tracking progress toward organizational goals, attending community events, and creating awareness of available program resources with food insecure and underserved community members.