By Jennifer Amato
Staff Writer
SOUTH BRUNSWICK – South Brunswick High School (SBHS) is popping more than usual thanks to a job training opportunity provided to students in the Transition Program.
The Pop In Café is a unique entrepreneurial venture located in the Brunswick Square Mall in East Brunswick. It provides training and employment opportunities for adults with disabilities in the areas of food preparation, order fulfillment and sales, while also offering a variety of other foods, according to its brochure.
Steven and Barbie Bier opened the café in 2015 to provide a place for their son Samuel to work. One hundred percent of proceeds fund Let’s Work for Good, a non-profit focused on creating meaningful and lasting employment solutions for adults with disabilities.
“The café is so important for the students who work there for many reasons. Most importantly, these students with unique abilities are being given the opportunity to work in a safe, welcoming environment. The staff members at the Pop In Café are trained to support people with disabilities, so the students are learning to work with their bosses and co-workers, in addition to having a job coach on site. Students are learning responsibility, a variety of job skills (cleaning, food preparation, customer interaction, etc.), and enhancing their personal hygiene regulation. There are countless benefits to this job experience,” according to SBHS Transition Coordinator Emily Wright and Job Coach Mary Abode.
Making popcorn provides a slew of job and life skills for students, the advisors said.
Through the Pop In Café fundraiser at SHBS, students copied fliers, stapled an explanation to each flier and distributed them into more than 150 staff mailboxes.
Once the orders come in, students will keep track of the orders by counting the money and adding names and orders to a master list. Once the popcorn arrives, students will be responsible for checking orders, filling the tins with the correct flavors, marking the popcorn complete, labeling the tin and noting where the tin needs to be delivered. Once the orders are filled, the students will distribute the tins to classrooms and then clean their work stations.
“This is a multi-step process in which students of all levels can participate. Each tin of popcorn ordered creates two hours of work for our students,” Wright said.
Additionally, the Pop In Café provides opportunities for the community, such as fundraising and awareness.
“There is a great sense of pride when students who work here, or anywhere in the community, recognize the importance of their work,” Wright said.
The Life Skills and Transition Program at SBHS provides students with disabilities skills necessary to live, work and participate in leisurely activities once they graduate high school, typically at age 21.
The school-based classes that the students participate in include Functional Academics, Vocational Exploration and Life Skills. The instructional program supports, but is not limited to, community living skills, employability skills, health and wellness, financial literacy skills, social skills, leisure skills, problem solving skills, self-advocacy skills and functional math and literacy skills.
Contact Jennifer Amato at jamato@gmnews.com.
