Barnstable Office

Putting Safety First

When food handlers take NEP’s workshops to heart, everyone wins.

Back in the day, grandma probably didn’t give a second thought to letting a frozen roast thaw on the counter. But as our awareness of food-borne pathogens grows, NEP educators are hard at work making sure that parents, food handlers, and even classroom teachers have the knowledge they need to protect themselves, their families, and their customers.

“We live in a world today that’s so different from the one we grew up in,” says Sue Bourque, Program Supervisor at NEP’s Barnstable County Cape Cod Cooperative Extension. “Our food comes from all over the globe, and passes through more and more hands. We really need to be diligent to dot all our i’s and cross all our t’s.”

That’s a particular concern on the Cape, with its wealth of eating establishments and young, inexperienced seasonal employees, combined with a vulnerable elderly population. The local NEP office rises to meet this challenge with regular trainings like Food Handling is a Risky Business, a workshop geared toward food service employees and volunteers at senior centers and other congregate meal sites, and ServSafe, a food safety certification program that helps restaurant employees meet state standards for safety.

Teaching may range from the obvious—the teenager who risks cross-contamination by constantly reaching for her cell phone while working, for example—to lessons that even many public health professionals don’t know, such as the fact that hand sanitizers cannot be a substitute for hand-washing among food service staff because of the types and amounts of contaminants. What’s certain is that participants walk away with a better understanding of their responsibilities, thanks to NEP’s eye-opening experiential curriculum.

“People are surprised how quickly microorganisms reproduce and grow on a surface,” says Bourque. Students have a chance to see their lapses firsthand through tools like “glow germs,” a hand-washing lotion containing microscopic glow-in-the-dark specks that reveal just how many pathogens remain around fingernails, rings, and callouses, despite what they believed was a rigorous cleansing.

Judging from the thoroughness and thoughtfulness of their questions, participants are taking the classes seriously, says Bourque, and making efforts to apply their learning on the job, be it caterers looking for ways to keep food hot, waitresses dealing with customers who want undercooked fish, or well-meaning volunteers overcoming their reluctance to discard rather than reuse rubber gloves. Not to mention that the restaurants and other agencies involved are grateful that NEP helps them protect not only their customers, but their business.

“It’s clear that our students aren’t just taking these classes to pass a test,” says Bourque. “They’re learning to be diligent about every step their food goes through. We’re really educating people.”

For more information about NEP Food Safety Education programs and initiatives, contact David Nyachuba, PhD, at 413-545-0552 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .