Taste of District 622 is Sunday at Tartan

The first ever Taste of District 622 event this Sunday will not only provide much-needed funds for the District 622 Education Foundation—it has also provided its student organizers with some invaluable life lessons about perseverance and problem solving.

The event—spearheaded by four students who are part of DECA, Jenny Anderson, Katalina Moua, MaLeah Peterson and Danielle Nitz—almost got canceled.

The students were originally asking local restaurateurs to show up at the school for the event to provide attendees with a taste of their food, however, that required the vendors to pay a licensing fee—which few were willing to do, Peterson said.

Education Foundation representatives told the students that if businesses wouldn’t commit, the event would have to be canceled.

“Lots of people were saying it’s probably best to just quit it now and just start a new project while you have time,” Anderson said. “We decided to stick with it and just figured we need to rework a few things and so it all worked out.”

The students figured they could transport the food from the restaurants to the event, and then give out the samples without a restaurant representative present—eliminating the need to pay a licensing fee, Peterson said. Fourteen local vendors signed on to participate under the new terms, she said.

In addition to the food, the event includes a silent auction and bake sale, Moua said, as well as face painting, crafts and gingerbread cookie decorating for kids, Anderson said.

The entire Tartan DECA program of about 28 students is helping out with the event, the girls said.

Seeing the event through, in spite of difficulties, taught the students a valuable lesson, said their adviser, Tartan teacher Craig Spreiter.

“Things don’t always go as planned in the real world and I can’t always protect them from some of that disappointment,” Spreiter said. "It is really impressive to see just how dedicated they were to following through on this.”

The District 622 Education Foundation will benefit from the students' dedication.

Due to the slow economy, the foundation is seeing more needs, and smaller donations, said board member Carole Anderson.

The foundation—which is independent from the district—provides an angel fund for each school to help meet student needs that are outside of the school realm, but can still be a barrier to getting an education. For example—the funds could be used to buy warm clothes for a student whose family can't afford them to prevent the child from getting sick and missing school, Anderson said.

“People will respond to us when we let them know the truth about how badly things are needed by the students,” she said.

The district now has more than 75 families with kids in the schools that are homeless, she said.

The foundation also awards grants to teachers to fund classroom projects. At one time the foundation had the money to award grants twice per year, but now they can only do it once yearly, Anderson said. Last year, teachers made about $60,000 worth of requests, and the foundation was able to fund about a third of them, she said.

The foundation gets its money almost entirely from private sources, she said.

“We never know where our funds are going to come from,” she said. “Generosity from the community is what we count on a lot.”

If you go: The Taste of District 622 goes from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 4, in the Tartan High School cafeteria. Ticket prices are $5 for students, $10 for adults, and children ages 5 and under are free. See the event listing for more details.