Culinary arts students get a slice of life in the pizza business at BJ's headquarters

Los Angeles Times

24-04-2025

Will Godoy's career path to director of talent development at BJ's Restaurants, Inc. was nonlinear. It is a point he emphasizes while speaking to a group of Marina High School students Tuesday at BJ's Headquarters in Huntington Beach.
'The path you want to take may not end up being the path you actually do take, things will always change,' Godoy told the teens. 'Certain advantages might come up, certain obstacles might have to be overcome, but at the end of the day your career usually ends up being what you enjoy.'
The students from the local high school are part of the California Restaurant Foundation's statewide ProStart program, a two-year industry-backed culinary arts and restaurant program offered at about 140 California schools like Marina, Fullerton Union and Newport Harbor high schools, and the Orange County School of the Arts. They are also among the 500 California students who participated in the annual 'Experience Hospitality Week' from April 21 to 24. The career-building experience gives students the chance to explore other jobs that exist in restaurants beyond the roles of line cook and server.
'Experience Hospitality Week is a statewide event where we are sending students to see the business side of food service and hospitality,' said Natalie Tong, programs director for the California Restaurant Foundation. 'We are taking them to headquarters, to venues, to food distributors where they are going to get to see beyond front of house and back of house. This plays a critical role for high school students when they are starting to think about their career paths after high school.'
The Marina High students spent the day at BJ's headquarters, meeting with U.S. Bank, one of the programs sponsors and their small business specialists to learn about business loans and other aspects of entrepreneurial finance.
'Our grant sponsorship to the California Restaurant Foundation is very important for us,' said Wendy Chau, community affairs manager for U.S. Bank. 'We are supporting community programs that help small businesses thrive, people succeed in the workforce, provide pathways to higher education and gain greater financial literacy.'
After learning about business financing, students headed to the kitchen where they learned how to bake a pizza. Then they broke off into small groups and toured various departments such as operations, risk management to understand safety protocols, marketing to learn about brand awareness and information technology. Additionally, they visited the beverage department to learn about the detailed process involved when launching a new non-alcoholic beverage at BJ's 200+ restaurants.
'We know they know the four walls, they have gone into a restaurant and understand what it's like to be a customer and order food and drinks,' said Godoy. 'What we want to teach them today is how all of that comes together within our company and understand how the different departments work together so guests can come in and enjoy those moments.'
Some of the students on the field trip participated in this year's ProStart Cup, a two-day competition to compete for $500,000 in scholarships. The competition is divided into two sections; a Culinary Cup and a Management Cup, so career paths in the culinary arts and restaurant management are familiar to the Marina High students. Yet, other aspects of the business they encountered during their visit to BJ's Headquarters were new to them.
'Learning about the creative department and what the design team does to make new food or how they improve to get customers to come back, is the biggest thing I did not know,' said Marina High junior David Hodson.
Hodson is considering a career in the culinary arts and likes to bake sourdough bread at home during his free time. Now, he said, he'll think about the design team whenever he visits a BJ's.
'Every time I see something new, I am going to know they made that, that team designed that,' said Hodson.
By introducing them to roles in the hospitality industry they haven't considered before, the California Restaurant Foundation is encouraging students to be curious about the different possibilities for their own futures and career paths.
'Students take the culinary class because they know they like to eat and they want have skills to feed themselves, but they are not necessarily industry focused,' said Morgan Molioo, the culinary instructor at Marina High School. 'Then they come here and they realize their passion for cooking can intersect with their interest in information technology, for example.'
Molioo has been the advisor of the ProStart program at Marina for three years and said the California Restaurant Foundation has supported her in creating a robust culinary program at the Huntington Beach campus, just three miles away from BJ's Restaurants Inc. offices.
'The class I teach is a career and technical education class, and the whole purpose of it is to promote and expose students to career pathways,' said Molioo.
Hearing real stories from successful people in the industry is one benefit Molioo identifies for her students.
'When they hear that Will dabbled in this and worked for this company or that, they come out with a sense of comfort, to be honest,' said Molioo. 'My students last year felt less pressure after this experience. They can see that these people in these jobs that really do well for themselves didn't always know exactly what they wanted to do. They ended up here because they were hard workers and they looked for opportunities. They see that and learn it is not just about having a 4.0 GPA.'
Godoy put a tremendous amount of time and effort into planning the day, ensuring the students would have a thorough experience. Lesson planning isn't unfamiliar to Godoy, who actually wanted to be a history teacher before he found his way to the restaurant industry.
'I majored in American history and minored in European history, and at the same time I was bartending. When I had the opportunity to either become a teacher or move up to management, I wanted to go to management,' said Godoy. 'My classroom changed.'
When the students meet in a conference room at the end of their tour — where they are served BJ's pizza, salad, sliders and salmon — Godoy shares more about his story, while answering questions and delivering career advice. The students pose for a group photo with him before returning on the school bus, and while he knows some of what he said will go over their heads today, he feels confident that one or two might take his advice to heart.
'These events are really important for high school students, mainly so they think outside the box,' he said.