The Blue Lake Rancheria Tribal Education Agency (BLR TEA) recently supported the Career Technical Education (CTE) pathway program at Eureka High School and Zoe Barnum High School by providing needed supplies to the Culinary Arts classrooms. CTE is a sequence of courses over multiple years that integrates academic knowledge with technical and occupational knowledge to provide students with pathways to post-secondary education and careers after high school. CTE contains multiple different “pathways” within the program, with each one covering different kinds of sectors that students can get experience in. One of these pathways is the Hospitality, Tourism, and Recreation pathways which includes Nutrition/Food Services, where students will gain hands-on experience in culinary arts, event planning, and customer service.
The BLR TEA coordinated with Culinary Teacher Talia Ciarabellini, for the purchase of a new stove for Eureka High School, books for the Reading Villages program, burners & hotplates, canning jars, proofing baskets, ice cream makers, and other additions to the Culinary Arts classroom. Plans are also currently moving forward to establish a greenhouse and garden shed for an authentic farm to table learning experience at Zoe Barnum High School! These additions to Eureka High School and Zoe Barnum High School’s Culinary Arts program will allow students to learn all about the Culinary Arts without any equipment limitations. The funding used for these purchases was drawn from a US Department of Education grants supporting Native American Career and Technical Education Programs and Native Youth Community Partnerships.
If you are a community member and would like to support the partnership between Eureka City Schools and Blue Lake Rancheria in order to advance Culinary Arts & Food Sovereignty Education, contact Talia Ciarabellini at ciarat@eurekacityschools.org
Originally Published: 3/20/2026