The DGN Career and Technical Education department will be changing the foods classes. For the 2015-2016 school year, Foods 1 will be renamed Introduction to Culinary Arts. Two new classes will also be added: Baking and Pastries, and Advanced Culinary Arts.
“We wanted to meet with the growing demands, especially with the emergence of shows like cake boss and different cake decorating shows and different types of desserts,” CTE Department Chair Mark Mirandola said.
Introduction to Culinary Arts will remain the same curriculum with minor changes , but will be primarily the same as Foods 1 and parts of Foods 2. DGN CTE teachers, Katelyn Kordecki and Rebecca Rahn, are taking workshop classes to be able to teach the new curriculum for the Baking and Pastries class, as well as the Advanced Culinary Arts.
“We went to a fondant demonstration, and will be attending workshops at College of DuPage,” CTE teacher Rebecca Rahn said.
Students this year had the options of only Foods 1 and 2, and the TCD [Technology Center of DuPage] program. The CTE foods teachers are trying to expose the options of the culinary arts to students who have an interest in a potential career in the food industry.
The Baking and Pastries class will consist of making foods such as cakes, cookies, candy, pies and tarts, specialty deserts, and more.
“Its a little more advanced, with more speciality desserts. Students learn piping skills and decorating foods and cakes. It’s for students with sweet tooths,” Kordecki said.
Advanced Culinary arts will include making appetizers, beverages, soups and sandwiches, casseroles, and global dishes.
“It was time to better align the classes more with college interest and also careers. We wanted to offer courses that hit on areas that students are interested with in potential careers,” Mirandola said.
Bruce Tanlim | News Editor
Jeremy Guinn | Staff Writer
