Sir Xsarus wrote:
I've never noticed that, and honestly it doesn't ring true. People used to learn how to cook at home from their parents.
Sure. And lots of people still do. But as more families became two-income homes, the need for Home Ec classes to fill that gap increased. But over that same period of time, the availability of those classes has decreased instead.
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I really doubt home ec ever was a major factor that taught kids how to cook, but hey I might be wrong, do you have any articles about this? Besides which I haven't seen this trend away from home-ec. It was always offered in every school I attended, and the people having trouble with this are older then I am.
Admittedly, purely anecdotal. But a quick search of the web indicates that I'm not the only person arriving at that same anecdotal conclusion. It might be some states though. In California, while I'd
heard of Home Economics (usually in the context of a joke), I've never actually seen one, or attended a school which offered one. We did have a couple course offerings that were similar (consumer math was the "home oriented" economics class, but it wasn't really the same thing). There was certainly nothing intended to help teach people how to run a home (balancing checkbooks, working out meal plans, shopping lists, etc...).
It seems to me that a lot of that stuff got absorbed into broader topics, then had stuff like sex education, health (or "wellness") tossed in, and ultimately the original curriculum of practical stuff got lost in the midst of a bunch of more theoretical teachings. That's nice and all, but it means that a whole lot of high school graduates today don't have a clue how to manage basic finances, cook anything more complicated than scrambled eggs, or iron a shirt.
Maybe it was different where you grew up...