BELFAST – The Belfast Area High School students taking part in the Waldo County YMCA’s youth advocacy program were sharpening knives and slinging skillets Wednesday as they prepared a meal to take home for their families’ nightly suppers.

Wednesday’s meal was the culmination of the past few months of training under the eye of YAP Director Tim Woitowitz.

Woitowitz has been helping the 18 students in the program learn about healthful living and how to prepare food on their own. He said the parents of many of the students are often too busy to put together a good meal at night and he decided to send them home with one prepared in advance.

“We’re making a chicken stir fry with all the veggies and sauces,” Woitowitz said. “They’ll be cooking the meal to bring home so the family can eat together. Today is special for them, and they’ve already told their parents to take the night off because they’re cooking.”

The YAP program is open to all middle and high school students and has grown in popularity since it started two years ago, he said. Besides learning self-sufficiency in the kitchen the students have taken field trips, been schooled in self-defense and learned to do CPR.

Woitowitz said he was expanding the after-school program to include students from Mount View High School in Thorndike.

Woitowitz said he started out teaching the students how to use a knife to prepare vegetables and fruits for cooking and serving and eventually moved on to having them prepare entire meals.

“Today is almost like a final exam kind of thing,” he said. “It’s to get the family together, which normally doesn’t happen too often, and also to help with their self-esteem. It shows to their parents, ‘Look I can do this, I can prepare this on my own.'”

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