Setting up cooking clubs

[Salpot]

Hi, I’m after some advice, I’m currently a food technician in a secondary sen school, I love my job working with young adults but feel the time is right to start my own cooking club aimed at primary schools. I know my sons school has after school clubs for sports and thought maybe this could be an avenue I could look into but just haven’t a clue where to start. Any advice would be appreciated thanks

I think parents would bite your hand off if you could get it going, and you have a superb CV for it.

I think there might be some practical hurdles. Cooking in our primary school is mostly confined to assembling salads, wraps and kebabs so I imagine getting access to cookers could be an issue, especially out of hours. What facilities would you need the school to provide and what would you bring? How would you deal with all the clean up afterwards? After school clubs are generally an hour at our school which doesn't give you long for the actual cooking once you factor in washing hands before and any cleaning up. I think you might have to be persistent as some schools might be put off by the hurdles, but you only need one or two so it's worth a bash.

Have you considered running it as a holiday club, maybe in your own home?

Holiday club is a good idea, to get started and figure out what works, and you wouldn't have to give up work. Couple of hours as an activity rather than all day though.

I'd be put off by a holiday club in someone's home. A local college or your current school might rent out their kitchens.

You could speak to some full-day holiday clubs around you, and see if you could run it as a paid-for add-on for their kids. Responsibility and insurance could be tricky, but it would give you instant access to a big market.

I've been trying to find a week long daily summer cooking camp for DD. They seem few and far between - the nearest ones to us are ~ 45 mins away. Which either shows a gap in the market, or a lack of demand, I'm not sure which!

Teentimestwo have you tried Supercamps? We don't use them ourselves but I know our local one does a cookery week

Second Thanks. Yes, they are the closest to us. Google maps has the two closest both at 40 mins away. It is doable but we've never been ones for commuting so it means the best part of 3hrs for an adult to drop off and pick up each day. It looks quite good and we'll go for it if DD wants to. We have two closer 'small cities' neither of which seem to have anything.

My primary dds go to cookery holiday clubs.£50 per child per day, includes lunch. Can pay with childcare vouchers.
I'm not sure it would work as an after school club because primary schools tend not to have domestic science kitchens.

Have you looked at www.smartraspberry.com. I've just bought a franchise with them.

What a fantastic idea OP. I think this sounds great and I’d definitely send my child.

Thank you all for your advice, sorry I've taken so long to read them all, but it's exam time and very busy. There are some really good ideas given and look forward to using some of them xx

@TeenTimesTwo have you had a look at Smart Raspberry for holiday cookery camps? portal.smartraspberry.com/Classes/?postcode=london&type=holiday

@Cookie111 Thanks, not heard of them, just had a look and they don't seem to operate in our area.