Trained to work

Rio Rancho High student K.J. Jiggetts rolls up dough while making cinnamon rolls in the new culinary arts kitchen. Looking on are, from left, Camille Sanders, Maya Thomas and Jocelyn Moxley. (Pat Vasquez-Cunningham/Journal)

The days of the traditional home economics classroom are quickly becoming a thing of nostalgia.

Home economics in many schools has morphed into culinary arts. High school girls, and boys, are no longer learning how to keep house, mend a shirt and cook up dinner for little Johnny and Susie. They are being trained for the workforce.

In keeping up with this trend, culinary arts teacher Fama Finley-Lara said Rio Rancho High School ditched the classroom setting and built students a culinary arts kitchen. Before the kitchen’s completion earlier this month, students were in a traditional home economics classroom that had only an electric stove.

“There’s no home ec. anymore,” she said. “We call it ‘culinary arts,’ and we don’t just stir and cook.”

Rio Rancho High School student Anthony Solnitzky, 16, pours flour into an industrial mixer to make dough for cinnamon rolls. (Pat Vasquez-Cunningham/Journal)

What they do is learn everything about working in a kitchen: from proper hygiene, the correct and sanitary way to wash dishes, and how to use and operate industrial appliances. The kitchen has stainless-steel appliances, including a gas stove, a sink, a large mixer and plenty of storage space.

“Now, I can teach to industry standards,” Finley-Lara said. “It was hard to do in the old classroom.”

The district shelled out about $757,000 to build the kitchen adjacent to the school’s main kitchen. It was paid for with bond money.

Thursday morning the students made use of the new kitchen, preparing cinnamon rolls.

Sophomore Christopher Rodriguez said it makes for easier cooking.

“We have more room to move around and do things,” he said. “It’s better.”

The school has been talking about building a new culinary arts space since 2006 and, the following year, the district earmarked bond money to make it happen.

The school uses the ProStart curriculum, which teaches students not only how to cook up culinary delights, but management skills they would need to enter the restaurant or food-service industry.

Finley-Lara teaches six culinary arts classes a day and said she is happy to see a move away from the traditional home economics curriculum. Students are given the opportunity to become nationally certified in a variety of areas, including hospitality, food management and restaurant management. Finley-Lara administers the certification test, which she said costs about $200 in the real world.

“But I give it to them for free,” she said. “This can help them get jobs and internships.”

Culinary arts students at Rio Rancho High create cinnamon rolls in their new culinary arts industrial kitchen. (Pat Vasquez-Cunningham/Journal)

— This article appeared on page 30 of the Albuquerque Journal