Gold Medal Classroom

Mar 28, 2024, 19:04

Gastrotypographicalassemblage Brings New Culinary Art to the CIA

Friday, 08 November 2013 13:43

Famous artwork by Lou Dorfsman, to be showcased in The Culinary Institute of America’s new Marriott Pavilion, will support the Hudson Valley as a destination for art and culture.

For the last 25 years one of the world’s largest modern typographic artworks has been hidden away in a basement on Long Island. This will change in January 2014 when the work, “Gastrotypographicalassemblage,” will become the focal point of The Culinary Institute of America's new Marriott Pavilion and Conference Center in Hyde Park, N.Y. The creation of legendary CBS art director and designer Lou Dorfsman, the work measures more than 33 feet wide and 8 feet tall, and consists of more than 1,650 individual letters spelling out culinary terminology and expressions, as well as 65 food-related objects.

From 1966 to 1989, Gastrotypographicalassemblage was on display in the staff dining room at CBS Network headquarters in the legendary Black Rock building in New York City. There it captured the imaginations of both visitors and employees, but in 1989 the work was removed during a renovation. Without a new home, it was saved from the landfill by designer Nick Fasciano, who stored the mural for more than two decades while Dorfsman worked to find it a new venue.

New Flavor Study Highlights Importance of Innovation

Friday, 08 November 2013 13:36

For the first time, says Technomic, a majority of U.S. consumers prefers hot or spicy flavors. And sweet is the ultimate pairing partner when staying ahead of the flavor curve.

The most familiar, tried-and-true flavors might have impressive staying power on menus, but Chicago-based Technomic’s most recent flavor findings also signal the need for operators and suppliers to stay on top of flavor trends by reinvigorating classic offerings with new and unique twists.

Three-fourths of consumers (73%) say that if they try and like a menu item with an innovative flavor, they would be highly likely to return to the restaurant for the same menu item.

“In a competitive foodservice climate, flavor differentiation is a must-have for operators,” says Darren Tristano, executive vice president of Technomic, Inc. “Because today’s foodservice consumers have such a strong expectation for innovative flavors, operators and suppliers have to help the menu stand out by staying ahead of the flavor curve. Knowing which flavors are up and coming and truly enticing to guests will be essential in gaining their dining-out dollars.”

Mayo’s Clinic: Helping Students Take Charge—Peer Coaching

Friday, 08 November 2013 13:34

The advantages of peer coaching include helping people realize they can solve their own problems while helping others. It also broadens their awareness of how many people they can call on for assistance.

By Dr. Fred Mayo, CHE, CHT

Last month, we discussed helping students take charge of their lives by using a technique called the three-legged conference. This month’s column is about peer coaching, and the rest of the fall will focus on other strategies for helping students learn to take charge of their education and their lives.

Coaching Explained
Coaching is the process of one person helping another person to clarify the coachee’s goals, jointly determining strategies to attain those goals, and providing support for reaching the goals. It differs from consulting since consultants provide advice based on their background knowledge and experience; coaches commit to help their coachees do what is important to the coachees. Coaching differs from therapy since therapists are interested in why, and they focus on the present and the past; coaches are interested in what and how, and they focus on the present and the future.

The challenge in coaching is really listening to the other person and not providing advice or judging what the other person says or wants to do. It is a full commitment to helping the other person in the areas where the other person wants to focus. Many teachers find coaching hard to do since it differs so radically from their normal work as teachers, dispensers of knowledge and evaluators. It is even hard to shift from facilitating learning to coaching; these functions draw on different sets of skills.

50-Minute Classroom: Playing Games

Friday, 08 November 2013 13:30

Using games to teach will get both you and your students out of a rut. A round of Hangman, anyone?

By Adam Weiner, CFSE

As teachers we get into ruts. If we are teaching one-month classes, one-semester classes or one-year classes, we tend to do the same thing every month, every semester, every year. Even if it works well, we get bored. When we get bored, the students get bored. When the students get bored, their education and our enjoyment of teaching both go downhill fast.

At the June Leadership Conference of CAFÉ I was able to attend a seminar entitled “You Can Lead Students to the Classroom, but Can You Make Them Think?” It was led by assistant professors Deet Gilbert and Sunil Atreya, both of Johnson & Wales University in Charlotte. The thrust of that seminar was that in today’s world, standing up and giving a lecture will not get the attention of most students, and even fewer will retain the material. In other words, lecturing to your students in the academic portion of your curriculum is dooming your students and yourself to failure. The seminar went on to cover at least 10 or more different games and formats you can use to liven up your class.

What really hit me like a bucket of cold water about this was that the second article I wrote for “The Gold Medal Classroom,” in March 2009, talked about creating word puzzles, crossword puzzles and other games to get the students thinking and interacting. I even listed a number of websites that had these items available for free. To my horror, I realized at the Leadership Conference that I had gotten myself into a rut and that I was not doing any of these games any more. It didn’t take more than a few moments of reflection to realize that my students absorbed and learned the material faster and more thoroughly when I was using the games. It was also clear that I was having less fun teaching the class.

Think Tank: An Introduction

Friday, 08 November 2013 13:26

“The Gold Medal Classroom” launches a new editorial department and forum for deans and directors in 2014: a leadership think tank.

By Paul Sorgule, MS, AAC

These are challenging times for culinary-arts programs. Administrators are faced with demands for measureable outcomes from various accrediting agencies, the cost of equipping and operating viable programs is increasing exponentially, and the price of education for students has increased far greater than other indexes (one leading culinary school reported that its yearly tuition alone increased from $8,490 in 1990 to $24,550 in 2010--or 290%) while financial aid and personal loans have become more difficult to obtain.

The ever-increasing number of culinary programs across the country has skewed conversions for admissions departments and increased their cost of identifying candidates (qualified or unqualified), and faculty are faced with teaching a student body that is oftentimes ill prepared for the rigors of a career in food. On the bright side, the restaurant industry in America is strong and growing and demand for qualified graduates remains high.

How do we sift through these challenges, face them head on, differentiate between cause and effect and prepare programs and students for a successful future? This is the most important task that faces program deans and directors. Too often we find ourselves dealing with the operational challenge of today and losing sight of the issues that will keep our programs viable and our students employable.

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