SALISBURY — The lobby at Henderson Independent School was transformed into a restaurant on Tuesday, while students performed the roles of servers and chefs.

The event was a community partner appreciation luncheon and it gave several students the chance to give back in more ways than just saying thank you.

Tuesday’s menu featured an appetizing salad with Italian dressing, baked ziti and a pineapple custard dish for dessert. Multiple students aided in preparation of the food, including 10th grader Eliejah Goodman.

“It was really fun, cooking with everybody and just doing new things,” Goodman said.

Goodman conceded that prior to Tuesday, he only knew how to make burgers. But now he has doubled his prowess. During the event, as any good chef would, Goodman visited the tables to gauge feedback from his guests.

Although initially nervous, the rave reviews went over well and reassured him of all the hard work.

“I love doing things for my community,” he said. “… to see random people that I have never met before to have smiles and to know that I gave them those smiles really made my day.”

Several ingredients for the recipes were gathered in the on-campus garden, which bloomed from a partnership with local nonprofit Happy Roots, an organization which emphasizes the importance of sustainability and urban gardening.

“We have our garden,” Goodman said. “We grow a lot of things. We grow micro greens, cucumbers, carrots, turnips and cabbage. Those little desserts we gave everyone had fresh mint we grew, too.”

In addition to gratitude for the Henderson’s community partners, Goodman said he had to thank teacher Ashlyn Coble.

“She knows a lot of things,” he said. “She helped us cook the ziti and how to do it all. Without her, (Tuesday) would not have been a thing.”

For her part, Coble said the students deserved the credit for being so willing to jump into it headfirst.

“They did a great job, a phenomenal job,” she said. “I was able to pull some of my food nutrition students who helped with the prep work beforehand, but I like to leave it open to any students that have an interest in helping. If they want to come and help and they are willing to then they are welcome anytime we do an event.”

She said another student came up with the menu and then they sat down and drafted a grocery list. Then came the fun part.

“I took a group of them last year on a field trip,” Coble said. “We went to Restaurant Depot in Charlotte and then we went to Sam’s Club and I let them essentially go shopping for all the ingredients needed to host the event.”

Students were also behind selecting the place settings and the utensils.

“I know they are fully capable but it is still great to see them actually dive in and really commit and make things happen,” Coble said.

The experience was one that the students simply could not get in a classroom.

“Having them be able to do something hands-on and that real world experience even if it is still in school, they love that and it’s so beneficial to them,” Coble said.

Tenth grader Leana Baldwin said the event felt less like a luncheon and more like a movie, adding that being able to say thank you to those community partners that enhance the school day at Henderson was impactful.

“We were saying thank you for all the things they do for us, as in coming here, donating money, creating safe environments for the students,” Baldwin said. “We appreciate it a lot. We can use the help and it is to our advantage getting students in a better mindset to get away from what they are going through.”

Despite being a self-professed poor public speaker, Baldwin still took to the floor to share feelings of gratitude.

“They were complimenting me about speech,” Baldwin said.”I did not think I was that good at speeches.”

Sometimes, kids can even surprise themselves.

Middle school English language arts and high school creative writing teacher Charity Ballard said it took a little urging for some of the students to get up and speak and to serve the guests face to face like they did.

“I was super, super proud of two girls from my homeroom (Virginia and Arianna) that were serving,” Ballard said. “They were not sure of doing it. Virginia actually gave the last speech. She was hesitant to do it and I had to build her up for a couple of days.”

Like Virginia’s remarks, the event took a lot of planning and preparation to pull off.

“The middle school kids did a lot of prep work,” Ballard said. “They potted all the plants, starting with painting the pots and creating the tags that go in there. They created all the decorations and put up the decorations. They also created parting gifts and bagged them up.”

The theme of the restaurant was a spring garden as evidenced by the decorations, but behind the ambiance was another them, attitude for gratitude.

“One of the things that I was teaching the students as a social emotional lesson is that there is research out there showing that you are a happier person if you show gratitude,” Ballard said. “You have a different and more positive outlook in life if you can be grateful and appreciate the small things you have in life. It helps your growth mindset and mental health.”

Overall, the activity led many students to engage with outsiders through meaningful connections and it got several of them outside of their comfort zones.

“They opened up and they engaged,” Ballard said. “To me, it is like that major breakthrough. A lot of times, when we get a new student here, it is an unfamiliar environment for them. They have left their home school and sometimes it takes a while for them to open up.”

As the work got underway, Ballard said she watched it all unfold in real time.

“When we worked on the decorations and stuff in home room for a couple of weeks I found some of the kids really opening up that had not opened up before,” Ballard said.

One guest, Salisbury’s own David Whisenant, remarked how authentic Tuesday’s pop-up restaurant felt.

“I was very impressed,” Whisenant said. “I was impressed with the whole set up, the way they decorated the room, the way they served the food and the food itself.”

He added that it can be hard to find service that good anywhere.

“They kept coming around and asking or a refill,” he said. 

Most importantly, he said that he could tell their hearts were in the right place.

“They sincerely cared,” Whisenant said. “They were not just faking it. They really cared that everything was going well and it showed.”