As the mom of 2/3 sons entering the college market, I spend a fair amount of time on various college boards/ forums to get additional information beyond the marketing hype received through the mail from the colleges themselves.
I posted a query about culinary schools and received very little information on the traditional college boards which don't seem to have much at all to do with non-mainstream degrees. Mostly I get references for hotel schools like Cornell or "food sciences"--developing mass produced food, flavor enhancers, chemistry based stuff, etc. Of those mentioned in this forum, I have seen only Johnson and Wales as a familiar name.
Those persons who are applying to colleges--looking at GPAs and SATs here--apply to SAFETY schools (know they can get into them easily, above range of the incoming class), MATCH schools (at the same level as incoming class and REACH schools (have strong desire to attend, but applicant is below statistical range of the school--especially those accepting less than 30% of applicants.)
Further, schools are divided up into Ivy League, top universities by reputation or quality of professors/research, subdivisions based on specialties like engineering, liberal rts, and business, private vs public and so on.
Kids today seem to be really status conscious if the boards are much of an indication--there are so many applying to the Ivy Leagues for prestige, hope for connections and hopeful payoff of higher paying jobs than other university choices. Of course, not all of the expectations are realistic since there are no guarantees per individual that all these reasons to go come to fruition to justify the costs. I'll bet that even those for whom the experience was not as sold, will self-justify to some extent. Further, not everyone can afford to attend the college of their choice, even if they have the credentials.
So, what I am slowly getting around to is whether culinary schools can be organized in the same manner as traditional colleges, i.e. Ivy League, Select, State and/or specialties. Does higher cost of a school lead to similar outcomes as one would expect in traditional colleges (generally better jobs, more $). I have noted there are culinary schools with similar tuition to , for example, the CIA, yet no one on this board has mentioned them.
So far, if I were on a college board, it would seem as if the denizens of this board were ony talking about 2 groups for the most part--"select" or "community college". There is not much information about the in between choices (all the others that on college boards would be "State schools", smaller liberal arts colleges and so on in 2nd and 3rd tier).
Why is this? Is the study of culinary arts and the growth of schools part of the result of a "Yuppie-interest" explosion such that many of the schools are too new to rate for education consumers? Or is there such a different metaphor underlying culinary arts such that, unlike traditional college, classroom education does not guarantee a return on investment? Is it really about internships and on the job training more than education?
If after 5 years, so few culinary students are still "in the kitchen" what does that mean? Most traditional college programs will not tell you that you have to love what you are doing, that only a few can make money (the TV foodie stars) or that one's education won't raise you much above the level of a "pink collar" job (based on some of the hourly wages I have seen posted here).
My underlying questions are: *except* for those who are totally keen on the culinary artist ideal (art for arts' sake, **** the money, self-expression)-- is the "classroom" education at $$$ only going to lead to short-term employment for the majority? Is it better to have additional fall back degrees (non-kitchen) if most people won't stay in the kitchen anyway? Shouldn't there be a quality guide beyond just certification to *all* the culinary schools if they are worth the price (in objective outcomes for students) to attend? Can the schools be organized along any similar groupings like traditional colleges use?
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Here is a interesting link from Escoffier which gives information on what criteria to use in evaluating a culinary school:
http://escoffier.com/phpnuke/html/contentid-2.html
(By the way, thanks for the first posting with all the resources.)
I posted a query about culinary schools and received very little information on the traditional college boards which don't seem to have much at all to do with non-mainstream degrees. Mostly I get references for hotel schools like Cornell or "food sciences"--developing mass produced food, flavor enhancers, chemistry based stuff, etc. Of those mentioned in this forum, I have seen only Johnson and Wales as a familiar name.
Those persons who are applying to colleges--looking at GPAs and SATs here--apply to SAFETY schools (know they can get into them easily, above range of the incoming class), MATCH schools (at the same level as incoming class and REACH schools (have strong desire to attend, but applicant is below statistical range of the school--especially those accepting less than 30% of applicants.)
Further, schools are divided up into Ivy League, top universities by reputation or quality of professors/research, subdivisions based on specialties like engineering, liberal rts, and business, private vs public and so on.
Kids today seem to be really status conscious if the boards are much of an indication--there are so many applying to the Ivy Leagues for prestige, hope for connections and hopeful payoff of higher paying jobs than other university choices. Of course, not all of the expectations are realistic since there are no guarantees per individual that all these reasons to go come to fruition to justify the costs. I'll bet that even those for whom the experience was not as sold, will self-justify to some extent. Further, not everyone can afford to attend the college of their choice, even if they have the credentials.
So, what I am slowly getting around to is whether culinary schools can be organized in the same manner as traditional colleges, i.e. Ivy League, Select, State and/or specialties. Does higher cost of a school lead to similar outcomes as one would expect in traditional colleges (generally better jobs, more $). I have noted there are culinary schools with similar tuition to , for example, the CIA, yet no one on this board has mentioned them.
So far, if I were on a college board, it would seem as if the denizens of this board were ony talking about 2 groups for the most part--"select" or "community college". There is not much information about the in between choices (all the others that on college boards would be "State schools", smaller liberal arts colleges and so on in 2nd and 3rd tier).
Why is this? Is the study of culinary arts and the growth of schools part of the result of a "Yuppie-interest" explosion such that many of the schools are too new to rate for education consumers? Or is there such a different metaphor underlying culinary arts such that, unlike traditional college, classroom education does not guarantee a return on investment? Is it really about internships and on the job training more than education?
If after 5 years, so few culinary students are still "in the kitchen" what does that mean? Most traditional college programs will not tell you that you have to love what you are doing, that only a few can make money (the TV foodie stars) or that one's education won't raise you much above the level of a "pink collar" job (based on some of the hourly wages I have seen posted here).
My underlying questions are: *except* for those who are totally keen on the culinary artist ideal (art for arts' sake, **** the money, self-expression)-- is the "classroom" education at $$$ only going to lead to short-term employment for the majority? Is it better to have additional fall back degrees (non-kitchen) if most people won't stay in the kitchen anyway? Shouldn't there be a quality guide beyond just certification to *all* the culinary schools if they are worth the price (in objective outcomes for students) to attend? Can the schools be organized along any similar groupings like traditional colleges use?
***
Here is a interesting link from Escoffier which gives information on what criteria to use in evaluating a culinary school:
http://escoffier.com/phpnuke/html/contentid-2.html
(By the way, thanks for the first posting with all the resources.)
