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DC Central Kitchen: Vince’s Story
Today, Vince Blair [name changed] is an active father, aspiring chef, and contributing taxpayer. A year ago, none of these things were true. In January 2012, he enrolled in the Culinary Job Training program at DC Central Kitchen, which has had unique levels of success with ex-offenders. This past summer at the Kitchen’s Alumni Picnic he proudly affirmed, “DC Central Kitchen changed my life.”




Kelvin’s family migrated from El Salvador to Maryland when he was a young boy. He was always an ambitious student and had dreams of supporting his family one day.
Two years ago Michael* was a high school sophomore with marginal grades. After graduation, he assumed he’d follow in the footsteps of all his family members before him; he’d get a low wage service job. Then he joined the Guitars not Guns (GnG) music program.
Jeff grew up in a low-income neighborhood in Northwest DC. His brother attended the neighborhood public high school and was robbed at gunpoint. Jeff wanted to do something different.
We had the privilege of having two children at Camp Fire, both adopted with special needs and identified as having serious learning and behavioral problems, participate in our program.