Top College Zine » Culinary Arts

Childhood Dreams

Zinney — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 03:48:11 +0000

Every child growing up has a dream of what he or she will be as an adult. Some children wish to emulate a parent or close relative while others latch onto a dream all of his or her own. Choosing a dream as a child could help formulate choices from an early age. While some kids dream about being a firefighter, a doctor, a teacher or a truck driver, I wanted to be a chef. While the kids in high school were applying for colleges, I was submitting my application to cooking schools and culinary arts programs.

After being accepted to a culinary arts college, I began taking classes that I had often dreamed of. Learning how to chop vegetables like a professional was thrilling for me. I learned the techniques of sautéing and blanching food items. I toke the lessons I had learned and used them in my internship at a local restaurant. Pursuing culinary arts degrees prepared me for with superb training to join a top notch fine dining restaurant as an assistant chef. Fulfilling my lifelong dream of becoming a chef started with playing in my toy room in my toy kitchen. Now, I work in one of the fanciest kitchens I could have ever dreamed of.

Technorati Tags: cooking schools culinary arts, culinary art, culinary arts degre, restaurant

Social Ignorance is Not Bliss

admin — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 16:00:59 +0000

I recently moved to a new city and started running with a new crowd of friends. A handful of them go to a “culinary training institute” downtown. They all seem like nice, down to earth people, but I’m worried about offending them.

I’ve been able to watch my mouth so far, but I get a little “simple-tongued” after drinking a little and a couple of times I almost let phrases like “culinary cooking schools” and “cooking schools” slip instead “culinary arts” and the like. Like I said, they don’t seem like the type to get offended over a little lingual gaffe, but I don’t like to offend people.

I guess I could just keep watching my mouth, but I can’t help but wondering if “cooking school” and similar variations are offensive to people in the culinary world.

You know, I work for a magazine and people ask me about journalism school. It sounds a little simpler than the effort my degree entailed, but I’m not insulted. Maybe a better example is that I work on my MFA in creative writing part time, and people refer to it as writing school. Now, that really simplifies what I am doing, but it seems to be acceptable.

They need to offer classes for these types of social issues.

Technorati Tags: cooking schools, culinary cooking schools, culinary training, MFA

Check Out Culinary Arts Degrees

Zinney — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 22:06:07 +0000

I am looking for a new degree or a course of study. With the current poor economy, I know this is the best time for me to start looking for culinary arts degrees, as this is where I want to be. I have found a number of different programs out there, some of which seem to be the best of the best. I’m puzzled by the options that I have.

One school I am planning to go to is Culinard. I think out of all of these programs and schools, this one has the most to offer to me. It has a full course of study, with everything that an individual needs to start cooking, from basic skills through the most advanced training. I also like that the school offers a few accelerated options so that I can do very well in terms of getting a new job. I see my future as a chef or working in another culinary profession. The more that I think about it, the more I realize that this school, or other cooking schools around it are the best option for me. Take some time to consider what these schools have to offer to you. I am doing that to be sure I pick the right one.

Technorati Tags: cooking schools, Culinard, culinary arts degrees

Standardized Tests

Zinney — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 21:18:43 +0000

Standardized testing has long been a controversial educational issue in the United States. While there are many arguments for and against the implementation of this sort of testing, the two that stand out above all others are the following. Proponents of these tests point out how reliable and valid facts and statistics can be drawn from the results of these tests that show administrators, the government and the population how a group of students compares to another group of students. Opponents bring up one of the main issues of the No Child Left Behind Act, which is to say that teachers may feel pressure to teach to the test instead of to teach to the student’s needs or to the subject’s inherent requirements. Of course, behind that complaint lies the idea that standardized tests cannot encompass the inherent requirements of each subject taught, though test makers are trying to get closer to that goal. The SATs, a standardized test required of high school students wishing to attend a college or university, recently underwent changes to include a writing section among the vocabulary and mathematics sections that already existed on the test. SAT subject tests are also recent in the past decade and a half, and seek to test a student’s abilities in a specific subject matter. However, criticism of these types of tests continues to rest on the notion that different students learn best from different methods, and the same can be said for testing the abilities of those students.

Technorati Tags: sat subject tests, sats, standardized testing