Sharon Steward’s cooking is a real crowd-pleaser — and her new cookbook is sure to be, too.

A Continuing Education instructor at Red River College, Steward is busy prepping for the launch of Volume: Cooking for a Community on Sat., Dec. 2, at McNally Robinson Booksellers.

The book is inspired by Steward’s role as the kitchen manager and head chef at InterVarsity Pioneer Camp Manitoba, a Christian summer camp located on MacKinnon Island at the north end of Shoal Lake.

During camp season, Steward and her staff are responsible for serving three meals a day (plus snacks) to anywhere from 180 to 200 people at a time. Suffice it to say, she knows how to cook for a crowd.

“Each recipe in the book has an amount for four to six people, and then also for about 80 servings,” Steward explains. “It’s a very exciting tool — one I’m hoping a lot of other places, facilities and individuals can use to help them serve their communities.

“(Given) the types of food service people do, people cooking in their community centre or their monthly church meetings or in athletic groups, this book has huge potential and there really isn’t a current resource like it.”

Steward graduated from RRC’s Culinary Arts program in 2002. Prior to enrolling, she worked at the Wildgrass Café on Pembina Highway and Bread & Circuses Bakery Café off Corydon Avenue.

She first became interested in cooking as a young child, growing up on a grain farm between the towns of Oak Bluff and Sanford, Man.

“Cooking and baking from scratch was a very natural and common part of our everyday life,” Steward says. “I have many memories of my mom and I packing up meals and taking them out to the field. We’d take a table and chairs out, and set up a full picnic on the back of the pickup truck.”

After graduating from RRC, Steward earned her Red Seal Chef certification in 2003 and her sommelier certification (from the International Sommelier Guild) in 2005.

From 2005 to 2008, she worked as the sommelier and dining room manager at Catch, a Calgary seafood restaurant run by famed Canadian chef Michael Noble.

In 2009, Steward and her family moved back to Manitoba. Her husband became the associate director of Pioneer Camp in 2012; she joined the team in the kitchen soon after.

“We live there from May to September, on the island with our three boys, which is great for me because I can teach in the off-season,” says Steward, who teaches a range of weekend and evening courses at RRC — on everything from seasonal treats to advanced knife skills — as well as its After-School Leaders program, in which high school students attend twice a week to learn basic baking and cooking skills.

According to Steward, the secret to successfully serving huge groups of people is “being prepared and planning ahead.”

“The [camp] volunteers are always amazed when I tell them, ‘You’re going to chop this 50-pound box of potatoes. It’s not for lunch, it’s not for dinner, it’s for tomorrow’s lunch,’” she says.

But making meals for large groups means you have to be more mindful of food allergies and sensitivities, something Steward was sure to highlight in her book.

“I had food allergies as a teenager, so to me, that’s been a natural part of preparing food for people,” she said.

“All the recipes in my book have allergy notes — like if it’s dairy-free already or if it needs a substitute — and almost all the baking items have gluten-free substitutions.

“That’s something we do [at camp] and I’ve seen the impact it has on these young people. It’s something I’m passionate about. As a young person who had allergies, going out to restaurants and having the chef come out to tell me that my food was going to be safe, that was very impactful.”

The McNally launch of Volume: Cooking for a Community gets underway at 7 p.m. All proceeds from the sale of the book will go to Pioneer Camp Manitoba.

To order a copy — or to peruse Steward’s recipes and blog posts — visit volumecookbook.com.

— Profile by Jared Story (Creative Communications, 2005)

In an era where vehicles practically drive themselves, you’d think the automotive trade might have evolved with the technology. But female mechanics are still almost as rare as flying cars.

Elaine Lagasse is hoping to change that.

A graduate of Red River College’s Automotive Service Educational program, Lagasse is also RRC’s first female automotive instructor. She sees the number of female students walking in – or perhaps kicking down – the door of the Automotive Technician Certificate program, and it’s not pretty.

“We probably average three or four per cent women,” she says. “So (in a program with 100 students), that’s three or four women. The numbers are very, very low.”

Lagasse was the only woman in her program’s class of 2004. She graduated with top marks and received the Ken Preboy Memorial Award before moving on to become a Red Seal Automotive Technician for four years, then landed her current position as an RRC instructor in 2008.

“There’s no reason why the numbers haven’t picked up more than they have,” Lagasse says of the program’s relative lack of female students. “I think the big thing is just breaking the barrier and realizing that there’s nothing that makes (the automotive trade) more suited for men versus women.”

Mathematics, diagnostics and electrical are just some of the skills required of automotive technicians in the ever-changing industry, which continues to become more computerized. When women enter the trade, they often feel out of place and judged, Lagasse says. Fortunately, that often pushes them to work harder and excel.

“They usually succeed because they do feel that extra pressure that they have to prove themselves. It’s not something they should have to deal with, being judged differently, but until we get the numbers up, that’s going to be the reality.”

Lagasse had no idea she wanted to be an automotive tech until her car broke down on the way to university one day. She realized she could either drop hundreds of dollars to get it fixed – and not understand what she was paying for – or she could fix it herself.

She chose the latter. After picking up the service manual for her vehicle, she was able to do the repairs – and discovered how much she loved fixing cars.

Before Lagasse knew it, she had a part-time job at Super Lube and had left university – and her dream of becoming a personal trainer – behind to pursue an automotive apprenticeship at RRC.

“It was more of a need than an interest at first, but it worked out well,” she says.

The apprenticeship program allowed Lagasse to spend five or six months in the workforce – in her case, in the shop at Murray Chevrolet – followed by eight weeks of classes at RRC. She repeated the process until she completed all four levels of the program.

Her experience at RRC exceeded her expectations and prepared her for the trade. After a total of nearly eight years with Murray Chevrolet – she worked there while she was in school and for four years after she graduated – she moved on to teach at RRC, where she’s now colleagues with some of her former instructors.

Teaching, Lagasse says, is the best of both worlds: “I still get to be involved in the trade, dealing with the technology and the car itself, without having to deal with the day in, day out, constant grind of the job.”

Grind indeed. Most technicians get paid on a flat rate system, so if you don’t have work – or you take too long on a job – your income can suffer.

Also, the shop conditions and materials used can take a toll on your health over the course of many years; Lagasse says she was glad to have landed her RRC gig before she had her two sons, ages four and two.

“That’s the thing too: If you get pregnant, you can’t really work in the shop,” says Lagasse, of yet another challenge female automotive techs face.

But she stands by her notion that nothing – or no one – should deter women from entering the trade, and even has advice for the three or four per cent she hopes will soon grow.

“Just don’t worry about what guys think,” Lagasse says. “If it’s your interest, stick with it; learn as much as you can and find the support from other females in the trade. Put in the time and effort and ignore the doubts that people are going to have about you. It’s well worth it in the end.”

— Profile by Lindsey Ward (Creative Communications, 2004)

Scott Hinkson has the kind of schedule that might have you picturing him slipping into a phone booth before rushing off to his next stop, red cape flapping in the wind.

By day, he’s a nose-to-the-grind Senior Project Manager at Western Canada Lottery Corporation (WCLC). After hours, he instructs on-campus and distance courses, including one he wrote himself, in both of the Continuing Education certificate programs he’s graduated from at Red River College: Business Analyst (2010) and Project Management  (2011). He also sits on RRC’s Business Analyst Advisory Committee, and at home, he’s a father to a busy almost-three-year-old son.

Hectic, sure. But somehow Hinkson still finds time to fit in performing as a successful local musician and working on releasing his fifth album.

“My first love is music, ever since I was a little tyke listening to Simon & Garfunkel on my parents’ old 8-tracks,” says Hinkson, who sings and plays guitar, plus pretty much whatever other instrument he envisions for his songs. Since 2004, he has released a short film soundtrack, and garnered local radio play and media attention with four solo albums.

“Nowadays, I have to book a day off for the house to be quiet enough for me to actually finish writing a song,” he says. “Usually I have about a 15-minute window to come up with an idea for a song, like while my little guy is having a bath.”

Hinkson’s time is much more regimented at work, where he not only schedules his own day, but his colleagues’ as well. As Senior Project Manager, he runs a handful of large projects at any one time, defining each project’s needs, identifying risks, then ensuring the project team delivers within the agreed-upon scope, budget and schedule.

Originally in quality assurance at WCLC, it was Hinkson’s involvement on a three-year, multi-million-dollar initiative beginning in 2007 that introduced him to both business analyst and project management work, and to the RRC programs.

“I started taking the Business Analyst program in preparation for flipping into a lead business analyst role. I like the idea of schooling for practical purposes, for real skills, tools and techniques that I can apply to the workplace,” explains Hinkson. “Then they ended up making me a backup project manager, then a full project manager in the same initiative. So I decided, hey, I might as well (take the Project Management program) too.”

After the major project wrapped up in 2011, Hinkson took on a full-time project manager position – an opportunity he says he owes to his RRC training.

“If I didn’t have that Project Management certificate, there’s no way I would be in my role right now,” he says. The program was also a great in-depth foundation for later achieving his Project Management Professional (PMP) professional certification.

Both RRC programs provided tools and techniques to help him problem solve and identify best practices at work, Hinkson says. As an instructor, his experience allows him to pull up practical examples and field questions from Business Analyst and Project Management students.

While Hinkson feels fortunate that his education means he can “flip flop” between business analyst and project management roles, he is enjoying project management because every project is different, with different goals and objectives – and once the project is done, you start with something new.

“I had a project manager once say to me, ‘It’s the best career I ever fell into,’ and I agree. Nobody ever really sets out to be a project manager; it’s something you just find yourself doing, based on other people’s suggestions and your own organizational abilities.”

So do project management skills find their way into his music career? Not really, Hinkson says… then changes his mind.

“Once I’m done with work I like to try to park that side of my brain – music is more of the creative side for me, so I try not to over-formalize it. Having said that, I just bought a book called Project Management for Musicians. I have yet to read it,” he laughs.

“So I guess it does spill over, when you think about it. When you write a track you have to figure out what is the song structure, what other instrumentation do you want to add, do you have the skills to do that instrumentation, who’s going to record it, what’s your budget overall? Then you have to determine, based on budget and schedule, how broad you want the production to be.”

By learning to play, record and produce his own music, he’s mostly taken scheduling and cost issues out of the equation, although time is the one thing he can’t always control.

“It’s not as if you can say to yourself, ‘I’m going to write a hit song today’ – it comes when it comes. You can work on it, but sometimes it’s like squeezing water out of a rock – it just doesn’t come naturally.”

Check out Hinkson’s songwriting prowess at his website.

Profile by Sherry Kaniuga (Creative Communications, 1998)

There’s a sense of pride that comes with creating a piece of furniture from start to finish. For Vern Bergen, that feeling is what led him towards a career in cabinetry.

“When you build a house, generally you have 30, 40 people working on in. You can say, ‘I was a part of that house.’ But when you build a piece of furniture, you have all of it. You’ve done it all,” he says. “There’s a lot more detail involved.”

As an instructor in Red River College’s Cabinetry and Woodworking Technology program, Bergen helps students realize the satisfaction that comes with creating a piece of furniture, cabinetry or millwork, and teaches them the technological aspects of the trade. But he didn’t always think he’d end up working for the RRC.

Bergen, 45, first became interested in woodworking as a child; his earliest memory of working with wood is helping his dad, a carpenter, work on the family cabin at the age of eight.

Bergen attended a vocational high school where he took a dual diploma program in academics and carpentry. He then got a job in DeFehr Furniture’s Product Development department, which he loved.

“We’d be the first to build (a product) and we’d have to engineer it. We’d have to make sure it could go through the plants without a hiccup. We did the thinking so the plant didn’t have to.”

Many of his colleagues had their Red Seal in cabinetry, and their advanced level of expertise was obvious.

“When you’re working with all these journeymen [cabinetmakers], you notice the knowledge that they have. It goes beyond where we’re working,” he says. “For lack of a better word, it’s like they’re in the old boys’ club. I knew DeFehr, but they knew cabinetmaking. Big difference.”

Although obtaining his Red Seal wouldn’t have led to an increase in pay, a desire to learn drove Bergen to take the Cabinetmaker Apprenticeship program through RRC. At the time, he’d been at DeFehr for seven years – and had no intention of going anywhere.

“In all fairness, I never thought I’d ever leave there. I thought, ‘I’ll be here forever, and that’s fine.’”

Unfortunately, a week before he was to receive his Red Seal, DeFehr filed for bankruptcy and Bergen found himself without a job.

He decided to give himself some time off before looking for work, and went out of town for a few weeks on vacation; employers had another idea.

“When I came back, I don’t want to sound arrogant, but it was like I had my pick of jobs,” he says.

Part of that is because both the RRC program and the Red Seal certification are so well respected.

“Employers really value the journeyman cabinetmaker… As soon as you become a journeyman a lot of opportunities open for you. In all fairness, this job that I have now [at RRC] would not have been available to me had I not been a journeyman.”

“My Red Seal is almost like a badge of honour,” he adds. “If I were ever to get a tattoo, I would get one of a Red Seal. I am very proud to be a part of the College.”

Bergen worked for a time installing kitchens, but when the position at RRC opened up he jumped at the opportunity.

“Being an instructor, you’re given more opportunities to help students. I want to give back what I’ve been given.”

The Cabinetry and Woodworking Technology program is different than the Red Seal program.

“I find the apprenticeship [program] is more learning the skills and how to apply them, where the technology part is ‘We’re going to give you a wide variety from all aspects of the trade.’ We’re more in-depth with the technology.”

Bergen says the Cabinetry and Woodworking Technology program is becoming increasingly popular.

“I’ve been there four years and now I’ve noticed from that first year until now, there’s been a bigger interest. And that comes from both sides – from students and also employers. I really see a big interest.”

Bergen is humbled to be featured in RRC’s current billboard campaign; the best part will be revealing the campaign to his father.

“My dad, who is 79, he does not have a clue about this [campaign], and he is very proud of what I’ve been doing. I’m taking him for a ride and I’m going to take him by [where the billboard is]…. And then he’ll look, and I will get a tear out of him. There’s not a day that goes by that he doesn’t tell me how proud he is [of me].”

Profile by Stacy Cardigan Smith (Creative Communications, 2006)

When’s the last time your work impacted a generation of students? Josephine Pulver has been able to make a difference in just a few short years.

Pulver joined Red River College’s faculty in 2011 as an instructor in Continuing Education’s Residential Decorating program. Since then, she’s implemented the Residential Decorating Practicum, partnered with Palliser Furniture to offer students the opportunity to design for an international company, and introduced two new courses: Decorating Software Applications and Eco-Friendly Décor.

“I think it might be a little bit of an ongoing joke now,” Pulver says of the frequency with which she brings ideas to her department head. But Pulver’s creativity and innovation is students’ gain – especially since RRC prides itself on producing industry-ready grads.

“[The College is] open to creative ideas,” says Pulver. “They’re open to suggestions as to how to move forward with the program. It’s not a stagnant situation.”

Pulver graduated from the University of Manitoba’s Interior Design program in 1995 and has worked in the industry ever since. She felt a practicum would have been beneficial to her own career and wanted to give RRC students the opportunities she didn’t have. Enter the Residential Decorating Practicum, which is brand new this year.

“When we graduated [from university] we didn’t have support from the community at all,” Pulver explains. “It’s hard to get your foot in the door to meet people. A practicum really helps a student because even if they don’t get a position where they’re placed, they’ve met people, they’ve seen how the industry works, and they have a reference.

The Palliser project is also new this year, and will hopefully prove to be an invaluable opportunity. In the final term of the Residential Decorating program, students will be tasked with creating a display booth for Palliser Furniture.

“I think it’s really important for students to actually work with real clients,” Pulver explains.

Students will meet with a representative from Palliser and design a booth based on the client’s needs. Palliser will choose one booth each year to build and use for furniture display purposes.

“It’s really exciting for students because they’ll get to see their work come to life, which is a very rewarding experience in design.”

The Decorating Software Applications course was designed to give students the computer skills to create 3D spaces, draw floor plans, arrange furniture and decorate rooms. The software program used in the course is compatible with AutoCAD and is a recognized standard in the cabinet-making industry.

“The training will allow students to pick up any drawing program when they have graduated,” Pulver says. “I felt it was important for students to be able to apply what they have learned in drafting to the computer. Most companies are using some form of computer-aided design in Winnipeg.”

The Eco-Friendly Décor course outlines the principles of sustainable development and design and discusses the decorator’s role in sustainability.

“Re-using is really the most sustainable approach to decorating – for example, if you were to look at going to vintage stores,” Pulver says. “If you were to buy something, you’d look at where a product is coming from, how it was made, [and] if the companies that are providing these products are certified and following environmental regulations.”

Class discussions go beyond eco-friendly décor and look at sustainable building in general.

“One of the best examples of a sustainable building is the igloo. It provides a home and conserves an ecological balance by not depleting natural resources,” says Pulver. “Sustainable buildings give us hope for our future. One example of a new sustainable building in Winnipeg is the Manitoba Hydro building.”

Pulver enjoys working with RRC students; before becoming a designer she toyed with the idea of being a teacher, so landing at RRC seemed natural.

“I really love the feedback that I get from students. It’s an interesting process – and obviously very different than interior design.”

For more information on Josephine Pulver’s interior design work, click here.

Profile by Stacy Cardigan Smith (Creative Communications, 2006)