Are professional schools for amateurs as well

[jersey13]

I grew to loath teaching amateurs because I couldn’t be honest with them. They paid to be in class, so how dare I tell them their tart looked like crap or their piping skills were laughable. You make comments like that to professional students all the time, in fact it’s essential to their progress. But with amateurs I felt honesty was often the worst policy.

Ugh. How about coaching their dismal piping skills instead of telling them that their technique is laughable? Why lie? After all they are paying you to teach them how to do x, y or z.

When I enroll in a "professional" culinary school, I'm paying them too, they better tell me if I suck. My law professors didn't hold back if something was flimsy at best.

I think you said it best -- you loathe teaching amateurs. That's fine.

I loathe arrogance in teaching.

I understand where you're coming from but I don't think Lesley's intending to be arrogant. Having taught adult learners and kids alike (different subject mind you) and participated in continuing education programs, I noticed that there tended to be an "I came to get what I paid for, so you just keep your negativity to yourself" type attitude among what we've been calling the "hobbyists" in the groups.

While their reasons for being in the courses may well be completely different from those with the passion for the subject and I will support their right to participate, I found that some lacked the courtesy to allow others to get what they needed out of the courses too, or weren't disciplined enough to check their egos at the door.

[beans]

Perhaps arrogance was the wrong word. I was thinking more like patronizing.

Again, something potentially offensive when paying someone to teach you with their list of credentials affording one to be in that position.

[Bux]

It may be more rigorous and challenging at Yale, but that is completely determined by the composition of the student body.

YES, that is the case at a university where you would want to be with your intellectual equals or superiors, but cooking school is skill and labour, brains and intellect have nothing to do with it -

As for the practical skills, you could also find a class full of ambitious young chefs to be who just don't care about turning or fluting just as much as you could have a mix...

I still say it's not right to put people in boxes...

If someone thinks brains and intellect have nothing to do with cooking, we know different chefs and we're eating in different restaurants.

The top schools, no matter what they teach, are the top schools only as long as they can attract a dedicated staff of teachers and a student body that is at least as dedicated to learning than the staff is to teaching. If your fellow student body is not stimulating, you're missing the better part of going to school and I don't care if it's an academic school or a trade school.

The one thing I'll add is that the very best academic schools take the brightest students without asking them to make a committment to going into teaching or research. I don't see why culinary schools should be different in that regard as long as all students adhere to a professional standard in the classroom.

[jersey13]

Makes sense Beans...

But she does have a point, though: people who take couses for kicks are a completely different animal as compared to the serious amateurs.

Bux: Your last paragraph about sums it up for me. Well said.

Edited July 2, 2003 by jersey13 (log)

[slkinsey]

Perhaps arrogance was the wrong word.  I was thinking more like patronizing.

Again, something potentially offensive when paying someone to teach you with their list of credentials affording one to be in that position.

You think she was adopting an air of condescension toward them; treating them haughtily or coolly?

I think it is probably best described as "an attitude that strikes you as 'elitist' and which you don't like." I, personally, have no problems with elitism -- even though I can hardly ever count myself among the elite.

[beans]

But she does have a point, though: people who take couses for kicks are a completely different animal as compared to the serious amateurs.

Well, then I'd say therein is a decision to be made -- stop teaching those sorts of culinary classes for the boob that can't boil water or suck it up and plod on ahead with the nice paycheck. Every job has it's pitfalls. I'm less than thrilled when I've got to deal with another bartender that doesn't even know what's in a 7 and 7. In the same, I was also less than thrilled with that ambitious new associate assigning out the crappy document review of 15 banker's boxes of old factory/manufacturing plant records for anything relating to the little word of "pcb" to me to be completed in an inordinate short period of time. Bleh.

edit: my proofreading *suuucccks*

Edited July 2, 2003 by beans (log)

[jersey13]

But she does have a point, though: people who take couses for kicks are a completely different animal as compared to the serious amateurs.

Every job has it's pitfalls.

Point well taken.

[beans]

You think she was adopting an air of condescension toward them; treating them haughtily or coolly?

I think it is probably best described as "an attitude that strikes you as 'elitist' and which you don't like."  I, personally, have no problems with elitism -- even though I can hardly ever count myself among the elite.

Elitism (is there such a thing?) is not a biggie. [i a former first chair of the Baldwin Wallace Youth Orchestra -- eegads, that was a long time ago!!!] If you got the stuff, well then you got the stuff.

The less than honest gush at someone's piss poor piping skills that would be considered laughable is in fact patronizing. I wouldn't know if it was haughty or cooly. Can't hear the tone of voice! It is too much the manager in me -- I look to coach and encourage the troops. I'm only successful if my team is successful. And that is how I view an educator ought to be -- however in the real world... ahem. Sometimes they are hard to find!

[SobaAddict70]

That isn't necessarily true. I learned a hell of a lot at cooking school and I ran into a lot of bullshit artists in the work place. You just take the best of everything around you. Then, after about ten years of absorbing all the good stuff, you start feeling like you know something about this profession.

No? Then let me say it this way and see if you agree:

Cooking (or other type of professional) schools teach you the basics and grounding with which you need to be able to perform at the very least, functionally well, in your chosen field. You have a basic knowledge of your craft. You can perform adequately when push comes to shove.

Your real test, and much of your knowledge base comes, however, in the field, when you're doing exactly what you were taught in school, under conditions and in situations that didn't pop up in school and are for the most part difficult to duplicate to a T.

Law school, to borrow from a frequently posted parallel example here, teaches potential lawyers how to reason their way through cases, how to write or draft a brief, how to communicate effectively, and gives them a basic grounding in the law. Law school, from my vantage point, doesn't teach lawyers how to be an effective negotiator, how to multi-task and coordinate efficiently, how to argue their cases in court (especially before a jury...oh sure, mock trials are good practice, but try doing it in front of a real jury with real stakes on the line, day in and day out -- totally different experience I'm sure). If it did, then we wouldn't have, as beans posts, associates who expect fifteen bankers boxes worth of document review in an inordinate amount of time. We wouldn't have, in my experience, associates who expect people to be as efficient as they are inefficient. Of course, one's experiences varies from the next person's. All I'm saying is that the knowledge that one gains from being in a training program is expanded upon in vast and incomparable ways once that person happens to be doing it in real time.

Soba

[slkinsey]

You think she was adopting an air of condescension toward them; treating them haughtily or coolly?

The less than honest gush at someone's piss poor piping skills that would be considered laughable is in fact patronizing. I wouldn't know if it was haughty or cooly. Can't hear the tone of voice! It is too much the manager in me -- I look to coach and encourage the troops. I'm only successful if my team is successful. And that is how I view an educator ought to be -- however in the real world... ahem. Sometimes they are hard to find!

Beans... I hope you understand that I am only jerking your chain in a friendly way. And I hope you can also tell that all I was doing was quoting the dictionary definitions of the words you were using.

That said, I don't recall reading anything Lesley C wrote that would indicate she made a practice of lying to amateur students and praising their poor piping skills disingenuously. I think it's more a case of making the decision to say nothing about the sucky piping skills, because such feedback is not well received and also because that is anyway not the reason such students are in the class. I refer you to Jersey13's comments earlier in the thread to the effect of "having taught ... continuing education programs, I noticed that there tended to be an 'I came to get what I paid for, so you just keep your negativity to yourself' type attitude among what we've been calling the 'hobbyists' in the groups."

Patronizing someone, as my earlier post of definition showed, is to adopt an air of condescension toward a person; to treat him/her haughtily or coolly. To condescend, by the way, is to assume an air of superiority over another. There is nothing in what I have read to indicate such behavior on the part of Lesley C towards certain students. Acknowledging to us that such students nevertheless had poor piping skills does not make one a poor or patronizing teacher. Also, the way to "coach and encourage" the troops, which you suggest, very much depends on the context as well the mind set and expectations of those being coached. As it so happens, there is a certain kind of maintenance and refinement work that classical singers routinely do on an ongoing basis called "coaching." From my perspective, I am not really interested in hand holding and sugar coating -- I want to identify what I am doing that could stand to be done better, and work hard to improve on those things. This involves a lot of looking at and working on things I am not good at, and not a lot of patting me on the back and telling me nice things. I do not continue to patronize (another meaning of that word) coaches who work that way. Needless to say, this style of work is not appropriate for an amateur singer who wants someone to help them learn the notes and Italian pronunciation for an operatic piece they have no business singing so they can perform it at the church social. There is nothing wrong, in my book, with a professional opera coach who doesn't care to work with amateurs for this reason, or who interacts with amateurs in a fundamentally different way than he/she might with me. This directly corresponds to Lesley C's remarks regarding amateur students.

There is nothing inherrently bad with understanding that someone is bad at something. There is nothing wrong with a teacher using his/her judgement to decide whether it is germane or prudent to inform a student of every shortcoming.

[slkinsey]

All I'm saying is that the knowledge that one gains from being in a training program is expanded upon in vast and incomparable ways once that person happens to be doing it in real time.

Absolutely! Is anyone suggesting that this is not the case?

[jango]

I sympathize with serious amateurs because I’m sure they have a problem finding a course that isn’t a waste of their time.

Maybe this explains why serious amateur students are opting for schools like the Cordon Bleu.

BINGO!

[SobaAddict70]

Absolutely!  Is anyone suggesting that this is not the case?

A portion of my original post from page 7 (emphasis added for clarification):

On the other hand, I don't understand why people have to be shoved into boxes as per Lesley's argument....especially when your real training is out in the field, anyway. All the training in law school or cooking school or paralegal orientation doesn't prepare you or anyone to become an effective lawyer, a skilled chef, or an efficient legal assistant, blah blah blah.

Lesley's reply to my post (also on the same page):

That isn't necessarily true. I learned a hell of a lot at cooking school and I ran into a lot of bullshit artists in the work place. You just take the best of everything around you. Then, after about ten years of absorbing all the good stuff, you start feeling like you know something about this profession.

Hope that clears things up for you.

Soba

Edited July 3, 2003 by SobaAddict70 (log)

[slkinsey]

A portion of my original post from page 7 (emphasis added for clarification):

On the other hand, I don't understand why people have to be shoved into boxes as per Lesley's argument....especially when your real training is out in the field, anyway. All the training in law school or cooking school or paralegal orientation doesn't prepare you or anyone to become an effective lawyer, a skilled chef, or an efficient legal assistant, blah blah blah.

Lesley's reply to my post (also on the same page):

That isn't necessarily true. I learned a hell of a lot at cooking school and I ran into a lot of bullshit artists in the work place. You just take the best of everything around you. Then, after about ten years of absorbing all the good stuff, you start feeling like you know something about this profession.

Hmmm... it doesn't strike me that you two are disagreeing there.

Your statement that all the real training is out in the field could be interpreted as implying that formal training is without real value. I read Lesley's reply as simply pointing out that she had got some valuable training in cooking school and that not all the "training" she got in the field was necessarily -- therefore it is not the case that all the real training is in the field.

However, your restatement has a different flavor than the quoted comments above. The way I see it, one forms a (hopefully) firm foundation through formal training and then builds on that foundation in practice. This does not seem to be incompatible with what either one of you has said.

...not that Lesley needs me to stick up for her, of course.

[Lesley C]

slkinsey is right. If I was condescending or arrogant I wouldn't have lasted a week as a teacher.

The worst aspect of teaching amateurs is the lack of time and continuation. You just can't get that much done in a three hour class.

Soba, the big difference between school and work is the way you spend your day. When you're in cooking school the program changes every day. At work it's the same routine day in and day out. Right after school, I started working in a terrific pastry shop. It was great at first but I soon realized we were just making the same things over and over and over again. After about three months on the job I knew my life would be wasted working in such conditions. The word tedious hardly begins to describe the life of a pastry shop commis. The learning stops real fast and then it becomes routine. I used to watch guys have cake icing competitions because they were so bloody bored. You know what it's like to spend every Tuesday of your life icing hundreds of birthday cakes, every Wednesday making hundreds of Fraisiers, every Thursday brushing corn starch off liqueur centers, or every Friday filling thousands of mini quiches, baking hundreds of tuiles, or rolling tens of thousands of cheese straws. I do, and that's not learning. That's torture.

[sandra]

slkinsey is right. If I was condescending or arrogant I wouldn't have lasted a week as a teacher.

The worst aspect of teaching amateurs is the lack of time and continuation. You just can't get that much done in a three hour class.

Lesley,

This is exactly the point of my whole argument -

There is a vast, vast difference between and amateur taking a three hour class that will maybe meet 2-3 time in total, and an amateur taking a full credit course that lasts 30+ weeks of daily classes and practicals - We do 10 weeks of basic cuisine/patiss, 10 weeks of intermediate and 10 weeks of superior - exams and assessments are 4 times a term plus final exams - along the way there is also the theory course and the hygiene course, both of which you sit exams for also.

You can't possibly compare the two types - apples and oranges.

The chefs in my course critique everyone's work equally, it is not uncommon to see people in tears in the hallways during first few weeks.

As for the wine drinking, socializing and chatting, well, we're just not allowed - any talking during the demos and you get docked points from your practical - wine drinking? only after the wine lecture - socializing, yes, take it to the pub after class, and if you come in to class even slightly buzzed, you're out the door...

We wear full uniforms to demos and if we forgot a hat or apron to the practical, either go down and get a new one, or go home...

So if you're argument is and has been that an amateur interested in a 3 hour class maybe is not interested in the full program...fine

But if you still want to maintain that any amateur does not belong in a professional program such as the one described above, even though they have demonstrated the ability and capability - we'll still have to disagree...

[jersey13]

slkinsey is right. If I was condescending or arrogant I wouldn't have lasted a week as a teacher.

The worst aspect of teaching amateurs is the lack of time and continuation. You just can't get that much done in a three hour class.

Soba, the big difference between school and work is the way you spend your day. When you're in cooking school the program changes every day. At work it's the same routine day in and day out. Right after school, I started working in a terrific pastry shop. It was great at first but I soon realized we were just making the same things over and over and over again. After about three months on the job I knew my life would be wasted working in such conditions. The word tedious hardly begins to describe the life of a pastry shop commis. The learning stops real fast and then it becomes routine. I used to watch guys have cake icing competitions because they were so bloody bored. You know what it's like to spend every Tuesday of your life icing hundreds of birthday cakes, every Wednesday making hundreds of Fraisiers, every Thursday brushing corn starch off liqueur centers, or every Friday filling thousands of mini quiches, baking hundreds of tuiles, or rolling tens of thousands of cheese straws. I do, and that's not learning. That's torture.

Lesley, where in Montreal do people go to become professional pastry chefs? Are there separate programs or are they all rolled in with professional cooking?

[slkinsey]

There is a vast, vast difference between and amateur taking a three hour class that will maybe meet 2-3 time in total, and an amateur taking a full credit course that lasts 30+ weeks of daily classes and practicals - We do 10 weeks of basic cuisine/patiss, 10 weeks of intermediate and 10 weeks of superior - exams and assessments are 4 times a term plus final exams - along the way there is also the theory course and the hygiene course, both of which you sit exams for also.

How many amateurs are really taking classes like this? What percentage of students in your class are amateur?

Also, we must consider the fact that different schools will differ as to the percentage of amateurs in such programs and the degree to which such programs accomodate them.

[Lesley C]

sandra, the majority of amateurs have day jobs and just don't have the time to dedicate to such a program. And most amateurs want to learn to cook, not necessarily learn to cook like a chef. You want to learn to cook like a chef but you don't seem to want to be a chef. I still find that a bit odd, certainly commendable, but c'est la vie. I still think you are the exception to the rule because a relaxed, primarily demonstration type course, is the norm for amateurs.

[Katherine]

There is a vast, vast difference between an amateur taking a three hour class that will maybe meet 2-3 time in total, and an amateur taking a full credit course that lasts 30+ weeks of daily classes and practicals - We do 10 weeks of basic cuisine/patiss, 10 weeks of intermediate and 10 weeks of superior - exams and assessments are 4 times a term plus final exams - along the way there is also the theory course and the hygiene course, both of which you sit exams for also.

How many amateurs are really taking classes like this? What percentage of students in your class are amateur?

Also, we must consider the fact that different schools will differ as to the percentage of amateurs in such programs and the degree to which such programs accomodate them.

It's probably about the same as in most courses of study, where half the students intended to be working only peripherally to their study matter, and even the students who were clear about what they wanted to be doing are now considering a variety of options as graduation finally approaches.

[slkinsey]

It's probably about the same as in most courses of study, where half the students intended to be working only peripherally to their study matter, and even the students who were clear about what they wanted to be doing are now considering a variety of options as graduation finally approaches.

I don't know what your school experiences were like, but I can tell you that the number of students in most any conservatory who intend to work professionally in music is a lot more than half. And I have to believe that the same is true for most law schools, medical schools, etc.

[hotle]

i'm coming WAY late to this one, and i have a hard time believing i read all 8 pages of this (excellent) discussion. i found it somewhat similar to conversations i've heard in my own 'profession' (technology), where the teachers, writers, rank amateurs, talented amateurs, pros, and outsiders all have their own views. so, i'm not surprised that the discussion got somewhat 'personal'......people here have expressed their views in the only way possible for them: based upon their own set of experiences and knowledge. and, between groups, there's always a certain amount of arrogance and snobbishness. the talented amateurs always point out the failings of the pros; the pros talk as if those without their experiences have no right to an opinion, and so on.

in the grand scheme of things culinary, i fall somewhere between 'rank amateur' and 'talented amateur', probably closer to the former than the latter. i say that because i cook by feel and taste, not by an underlying foundation of knowledge or vast arsenal of recipes. i know some of the basics, though not nearly all. i can do some of them well.....i can make bread and pasta by hand from memory. i've never made 'real' demi-glace. i can prep quickly and professionally, though almost certainly not as quickly as a 'real' pro. i can't tell you from memory what a mornay sauce would go beautifully with. i can do a mean 6-hour smoked rubbed rack of ribs, but BUY bbq sauce to go with them.

taking courses is (to me) about acquiring a set of knowledge and skills. which courses or schools you're admitted to should be predicated upon a set of entrance criteria (one of shaw's points, with which i agree totally). what you DO with that knowledge and skillset is totally up to you (which is where my agreement with shaw's posts on his experiences in law school diverges). if you meet the entrance criteria, and you have the motivation and desire to complete the coursework, it's complete nonsense for anyone to judge your motives (so it seems to me) or tell you that a question you ask is 'stupid', 'self-serving', or anything of the sort. one doesn't take a course with the main goal of being named mr. or ms. congeniality, or 'most popular' at the end of the semester. if the 'wrong' people are taking the course, it's a problem with course design, not the students. prob'ly another argument, though.

so, at the highest level of abstraction, i'm with the amateurs. the argument about what would happen to juliard or harvard or or or if a bunch of 'ok' students went there is somewhat nonsensical; their entrance criteria would make this nearly impossible, and certainly the coursework would weed the 'ok' people out. if a rank amateur wants to go to the cia, they meet entrance criteria, they meet financial criteria, and they have the motivation (whatever that motivation is), then i don't believe anyone has the right to tell them they can't, or to belittle their choice.

this brings one to another of shaw's excellent points: there are a number of associate-level programs in most large cities that treat cooking as a vocation. from what i'm hearing on this thread, none of the folks who don't plan to actually work in the field are attending them; they're going to lcb and the cia and and and and. 'named' schools. having an economics degree, i understand the concept of 'utility', which really equates to the value one sees in any sort of good or service. how much 'better' are the classes at lcb or the cia than those at the institutions shaw talks about? (this is not a rhetorical question - i don't know the answer, but perhaps there are opinions out there.) if the skill sets acquired are roughly similar, would it not be of greater 'value' to attend one of these lower-cost options than spend the big bucks to go to lcb? or, is the value in being able to say to friends and family.......'learned this one in that year i spent at lcb', or 'i learned this from chef abc, who was my instructor at the cia'? i don't mean to demean here; only to point out that some of the resentment i hear from the pros on this site seems to be targeted at the rich folk going to 'name' schools.

finally, i strongly agree with the posters who've said that it's not what school you attend first and foremost, it's what you DO with the knowledge - how you APPLY it - that will make you successful in this world. i've met folks from ivy league schools who couldn't reason their way out of a traffic jam (they have, as we used to say back home, lotsa book learnin', but no common sense), and i've met folks from the same schools who are among the absolute, most brilliant and successful people i've known. applied knowledge, motivation, and attitude determine success, in my experience. education's just one of the inputs.

from my own standpoint, though, i'd never want to pursue a full-fledged culinary program. i also don't want just demonstration. i need something in-between that will allow me to be hands-on. that's not a 3-hour class, but it ain't a 2-year program, either. that's just my personal choice.

good discussion!

matt

[Bux]

Following up on Matt's (hotle) post, I think it's worth mentioning that Julliard has demanding entrance criteria, you don't learn how to play an instrument at Julliard. The top academic colleges also do a pretty heavy job of trying to assess your academic prowess and penchant for learning. No one is going to take their first math, science or literature course at Yale. People go to culinary school without ever having eaten in a white tablecloth restaurant. Students at Julliard have undoubtedly attended many concerts. Yalies have most likely read a belly full of books without pictures. There are students at culinary schools who may never have eaten at a white tablecloth restaurant, let alone one with three or four stars -- forget Michelin starred restaurants. For the most part, it's a vocational school rather than professional school, but of course culianry schools vary. I am also aware I was the one who said "blue collar" was an absolete term. I'm not demeaning the education or the people who go there, but I'm pointing out that many attend with little idea of what's at the end of the rainbow -- and I'm talking about the ones who intend to enter the profession more than the amateurs.

[beans]

This is brief for the constraints of time (I'm at work).

slkinsey: This is what the good folks of the Oxford Dictionary defines patronizing:

t verb 1 [often as ADJ.] (patronizing) treat with an apparent kindness which betrays a feeling of superiority: ‘She's a good-hearted girl,’ he said in a patronizing voice | she was determined not to be put down or patronized.

hotle: Outstanding post. Welcome to eGullet!

[Katherine]

It's probably about the same as in most courses of study, where half the students intended to be working only peripherally to their study matter, and even the students who were clear about what they wanted to be doing are now considering a variety of options as graduation finally approaches.

I don't know what your school experiences were like, but I can tell you that the number of students in most any conservatory who intend to work professionally in music is a lot more than half. And I have to believe that the same is true for most law schools, medical schools, etc.

Wow, that's a big "etc"!

Most of my educational experience is in universities. (I have 2 undergraduate degrees in the sciences, and am doing graduate work now.) Most people in higher education are not studying medicine, law, or music. They have a clear idea of what they want to do when they start, but by the time graduation comes, they just want to hit the road.

I have never studied in a conservatory, my music training having ended after HS graduation. Music schools are a good example of diversity of training here. Some are extraordinarily selective; others accept all comers, allowing those who should've known better than to apply to drop out after one expensive semester. Berklee's the second kind. If you graduate, you get a good education, but you know it was subsidized by wannabees who couldn't have gotten accepted at a community college.

I also have a degree in Culinary Arts, that I got when I was young and impressionable. After graduating, I only worked in the field during periods of extended unemployment. Everyone who started that program wanted to cook professionally, but many had changed their minds by the time they graduated, or redirected into a semi-related field.