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Innovations in Teaching: Culinary Arts

A student's Thai coconut soup for Chef Wan Ho Kou's Asian cuisine class.

The Culinary Institute transitioned all of its hands-on coursework during the pandemic to remote learning, using partial lab fee refunds in the form of gift cards to allow students to purchase needed supplies for recipes they now cook at home. “The faculty members have been great about providing alternative solutions for students to complete assignments,” says Culinary Arts Associate Dean Jeffrey Coker. “To my knowledge, everyone has been willing to support the cause and work with each other to find a solution that is beneficial to all.”

Cynthia Alberts, an assistant professor in Culinary Arts, has also used Facebook to deliver live instructional videos for students, who use kits containing dry ingredients she prepared for each assignment that they picked up from school. “I had to rework assignments and content so it is doable for the students,” she says. “I basically have had to work seven days a week since spring break to bring viable content to students.” From her own kitchen at home in Cottonwood Heights, Alberts can be seen – still wearing her chef uniform with the SLCC logo – using fondant to demonstrate a draping technique for a baking class. The biggest distraction, she reports, is getting phone calls during a live demo – a time, she adds, to put the phone on airplane mode.

Many of Leslie Seiferle’s students within the School of Applied Technology & Technical Specialties lost their jobs in the hospitality industry, going from working 60 hours a week to zero. Some of those students also lost employer sponsorships essential to completing Seiferle’s competency-based coursework where they demonstrate progress while on the job. Her students now pick up supplies, watch videos online and complete assignments at home. “Students who are no longer working are re-directing that energy into these assignments,” says Seiferle, who also hopes the extra time devoted to projects is a bit of an “escape” from the harsh realities of these unusual times. WebEx meetings, she notes, have been used for students to exchange information about SLCC’s Students in Crisis Fund, how to apply for unemployment and where to access the college’s Bruin Food Pantry and other local food charities.

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