Student Activities
Fitness and Recreation
Student memberships at a local health and fitness center are provided to full-time students at no extra cost. Students may use facilities at the First in Fitness athletic complex. Seasonal opportunities for outdoor recreational activities are abundant and include hiking, biking, kayaking, skiing, and snowboarding. Students are encouraged to develop a plan for life-long maintenance of good health and overall well being.
Supplemental Programs
NECI provides an ongoing and varied series of speakers and guest lecturers. These visitors introduce students to new trends in the culinary and hospitality fields, as well as exposure to experts in all aspects of the food and beverage industry.
Recent guest speakers have included: Alton Brown, creator and host of the Food Network’s Good Eats; Steven Saunders, Master Chef of Great Britain; Sidney Mintz, food anthropologist and professor emeritus of Johns Hopkins University; Chef Ana Sortun of Oleana’s in Boston; David Abella, corporate Chef of Roy Yamaguchi’s Roy’s in Maui, Hawaii, and Gordon Hamersley, Chef/owner of Hamersley’s Bistro in Boston.
Guest speakers have addressed subjects such as entrepreneurship, butchering, ice carving, wine tasting, chocolate, nutrition, food service sanitation and safety, culinary history, and drug and alcohol abuse awareness. Field trips to various locations may be scheduled as part of the curriculum. Students may visit such places as local restaurants, farmers’ markets, creameries, bakeries, fish and produce markets, a coffee-roasting plant, organic farms, and maple sugarhouses.
Special Activities
To encourage volunteerism and promote community involvement, NECI encourages students to participate in community service events. Students cook for soup kitchens, conduct demonstrations at local schools, assist at the local foodbank, and participate in community events. A Service Learning component in each program helps foster a culture of community involvement.
Students participate in professional organizations such as the American Culinary Federation and SkillsUSA on campus, and have opportunities to explore organizations such as Slow Food Vermont, the Vermont Fresh Network, Chef’s Collaborative, the Bread Bakers’ Guild, and Women Chefs and Restaurateurs. In the past, students have traveled to competitions, cooked at the James Beard House in New York City, participated in the Spinazzola Gala in Boston, and participated in a variety of conferences.
Students may organize student activities both on and off campus through Student Services. Activities may include sporting events, cooking competitions, trips to local producers, visits to markets in nearby Montreal or Boston, wine tasting events, and movie or game clubs.
For more information, please consult the NECI academic catalog.
Check out the recap from a recent student trip to Montreal to enjoy the food and culture.
