I've totally thought that modern home ec would be an excellent addition to a student's (boys and girls) schedule. A bit idealistic though, given the sad state of education funding and NCLB-induced testing standards. I'd say education as a whole is in need of an overhaul. We need PE, Music, Art, Home-Ec, hell, even Personal Finance in schools today. Unfortunately, all we often get is teach-to-the-test curricula.

I had home ec in middle school and it was co-ed. In class we had many projects, including making a pair of pants and various cooking lessons. Since my parents both worked full time and put long hours in, they did not cook and often did not have time to spend with my sister and I. If it was not for home ec, I would have never learned that I love cooking! Not only is it fun, but it is an important life skill. I think home ec could be a valuable source of knowledge for the young people of today.

Ah! I remember taking home ec (early 90s). I think everyone had to take it (and Shop!). I probably learned a few skills...I learned how to use a sewing machine for sure. Honestly, I hadn't thought about it not being a standard part of the curriculum anymore!

In addition to meal preparation, home ec should teach basic sewing skills like sewing on a button, hemming, and darning.

I still remember and use some of the things I learned in home ec class. And I think it's a shame it's not offered in schools anymore.

Personal Finance was a part of our (co-ed) home ec class. They taught us how to create a budget, balance a checkbook, etc. Except they didn't go over how student loans and credit card debt worked. I think that should be a part of home ec classes too.

I took Home Ec. in high school. It was required for 2 years I think. But I ended up taking more. And I am so thankful I did! I can sew garments from scratch, I can alter garments, design and make curtains, as well as cook. The list of life skills I learned is huge from taking elective classes in high school. I also took Metal Shop and two years of Architectural Drafting. Now I wish I had also taken Wood Shop as I have tried to learn woodworking in Adult Ed but I am not doing so well. I feel fortunate to have attended public schools in the 70's when schools offered a WIDE VARITY of classes.

I took "Foods 1" in high school, and it was amazing how many people in the class didn't even know how to boil pasta before that. I shudder to think what would happen if those people were loosed on the world without taking that class. Then again, I shudder to think what's going to happen now that the kids I went to school with have been loosed on the world anyway.

Not even with just food: I swear - being the sewing guru in my group of friends - if I get asked to hem one more pair of pants, I'm going to lose it. It's a very simple thing to do, if you know how.

I took home-ec in middle school and learned how to sew and cook a few (very unhealthy) things. I also took "chef" and "gourmet" in high school, which were definitely useful, although pretty outdated. I attended an alternative HS my senior year, where we learned how to grocery shop on a budget, and still buy healthful items. That was probably one of the most useful classes I took!

We had it in middle school, and I didn't find it sexist since the boys had to take it too! You learned how measure out things, how to bake a few things, how to clean up and how to cook a few things (like pizza though haha). It was really fun mostly. I would never have learned how to properly measure out flour if it were not for home ec.

My only memories of home ec in junior high (late 90's) are making puppy chow, mac and cheese from the box (but we did add a slice of American cheese into the mix), and sewing an apron.

I would love to see a revamp of home ec so that kids begin to understand at a young age how much healthier cooking at home can be. Cooking and sewing are such useful things to know. (I just wish I would have taken shop to learn how to change my own oil.)

i took foods 1, 2, and gourmet in high school, and it definitely helped shape my love of food and of cooking.

the running back and the capt of the football team also took the classes, but i think it was mostly for the extra meal each day. :)

I loved Home ec and I learned how to sew and cook - it was co-ed, as was tech ed (shop class). I didn't realize that it isn't taught anymore?

My husband and I were just talking about this yesterday. My mother bemoaned the fact that I never took home ec - it was offered at my middle school, but only as a "second tier" elective - i.e., if you weren't in choir/band/orchestra/art/athletics, you took shop and home ec to fill the credit hour. So I didn't really learn to cook (despite mom's best efforts) until I was in my twenties, and I still can't read a sewing pattern - and I'm one of the best-home-educated of my friends, since I knew how to iron, do my own laundry, and balance a checkbook before graduating college.

Unfortunately, as other commenters have noted, there are already so many "non-essential" classes being cut (P.E., fine arts, shop courses) that I don't see a return to even optional home ec, much less mandatory home ec, anytime soon, despite the evident benefits.

I think its important and should be offered (I have a sister that is a Home EC teacher, so it is offered still in some areas - although its become a bit more health oriented than nutrition oriented). We do the next generations a disservice when we don't teach them about proper diet and how to prepare their own food.

The last time I checked, men have to eat too. I've even had to sew on a few buttons in my lifetime. I have a degree in mathematics but I've often thought that the most valuable educational experience of my life was two years in junior high where we had a semester each of drafting, metal work, wood work and electricity. Home economics or at least a course on how to boil water would have been a most excellent addition to that curriculum. When did we get away from teaching anything practical in school?

I agree wholeheartedly with STLcolleen and omglawdork.

I think it would be great if more kids took home ec! In fact, I think it should be required for all kids! I wish I had been able to take it; at my middle school it had a terrible reputation (not for being sexist or useless, just a sub-par, checked out teacher). At my high school they were trying to cram so many AP's down our throats that it wasn't available. With the all-important standardized testing these days, life skills really seem to have been put on the back burner. A lot of kids parents don't have the time to show them how to cook or sew. If more kids were taught to cook nutritionally balanced meals, we could potentially be a much healthier nation. And not so many college students would get stuck in the ramen noodle rut.

@clampers, I love your thoughts on the finance part. Imagine how many people that save from financial problems later in life! I was lucky to have parents who taught me that stuff, but a lot of kids don't get that at home.

It's sad that some school administrators seem to think it is old-fashioned and unimportant to teach kids how to live.

When I was in high school (graduated '01) there was a required "life skills" class. The original intent of the class was to teach skills like basic cooking, personal finance, writing a resume, first aid, etc. However the teacher who had taken over the class from the one who created it made it totally useless by handing out a lot of busy work about what we wanted our future to be to get out of actually teaching. The only useful thing I remember from that class was when a local EMT came in and taught us first aid and CPR (very useful actually, used the first aid knowledge repeatedly). The class no longer exists according to my mom who works in that school.

I use what I learned in home ec EVERYDAY, unlike anything else I ever took in HS. When my teacher passed away a few years ago it was like losing a close relative, she meant that much to me (as well as many of her other students)

Home Ec was hands down one of the most popular classes in my high school (for both genders). We had the coolest teacher ever (Hi, Ms. Erikson!!!) and people literally fought to be in her classes. She taught cooking, sewing, cleaning, and even etiquette. To this day, I am grateful for the things that I learned in her class and use them all the time.

Yes, bring back Home Ec and personal finance!!

I took Home Ec in middle school in the late 90's; it was part of the required curriculum. It was a one semester co-ed class, and we learned basic stuff about personal finance, cooking, and sewing. Stuff like how to read and follow a recipe, how to cut fabric, work a sewing machine, or sew on buttons.

Most of the stuff we cooked was kinda junky , though, so I'd love to see the focus shift to healthier food. Of course, that'll probably be difficult for many of the same reasons that keep schools from serving healthy food in their cafeterias.

I took Home Ec (I think it had a fancy name like "Family and Consumer Sciences") in middle school as part of the required curriculum along with Art, Music and Industrial Technology. That was '96-'98. As far as I know, it's something that they're still teaching.

It seems like all of those classes are falling by the wayside, and it's such a shame! Not only were they fun, but I can quantify skills that I still use today that were born in those classes.

I also agree with a lot of the posts that many essential 'elective' type classes have gone to the wayside due to budget cuts in schools. If you can't have the class, perhaps its possible to start up a Home Ec club? Perhaps trips to restaurant kitchens? Volunteer teachers? Pot luck parties? Sewing for charity projects?

As for myself, I would have loved a great home ec class! What I was required to take in middle school, however, was a joke. We wrapped marshmellows with canned bisquits and made cake-box cookies. I learned nothing :(

We had sewing classes in middle school and in high school the department was called "Personal Family Life Sciences" and included cooking and sewing. The foods classes were very popular with boys and girls alike.

I think it is a good idea. Everyone needs to know (male and female) how to feed themselves, plan healthy budget friendly family meals, as well as how to balance a checkbook, sew a button on, and even change a flat tire, etc.

I still remember my Home Ec teacher saying that she had no sympathy for a man who couldn't make himself a meal and a woman who couldn't change a flat tire.

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I had a class in junior high about 8 years ago called personal development that was required for all the 7th graders to take. We learned things that I still use today. Sewing, cooking, food safety, etc. In high school there wasn't a home ec class but the cooking and sewing classes were really popular.

We took Home Ec. in 6th and 7th grade (94-95)...and it was cooking and sewing. We learned to cook bacon, wash dishes correctly, bake a cake, and how to use measuring cups/spoons correctly. What I remember best was getting yelled at for rinsing a pan in cold water.

We also sewed a pillow, a locker caddy, and a duffel bag. I wouldn't have learned to sew otherwise, and I'm eternally grateful that I can read a pattern, back-stitch, throw a zipper on that mother, and thread a machine! The pillows were hideous and had felt lions on them btw.

i never took it because my school didn't offer it, but i think it should be mandatory, especially with most kids leaving home for college. i'm pretty lucky because i learned to cook from my mother before i left home for college, but many of my friends can barely cook pasta, and they always tell me that they wish they knew how to cook tastier, healthier meals. not to mention that it's way cheaper cooking than eating out. how to operate basic kitchen and household applicances should be taught too, as some of my friends can't even turn on an oven.

also, as a vet student, i think that home ec classes should also teach students basic pet care and responsibilities, as this is something that should be learned from a young age.

I think home ec would be a useful extra class for senior students before moving out of home & going out into the world with no idea how to cook a meal or iron. I took home ec in the 10th grade we learnt how to make bread & cakes, fix socks and other basic sewing, food safety, ironing, dishwashing. It was useful stuff, boys took the class too.

I would have also appreciated some knowledge on rental laws at that time too. I think that is something students would find really useful in future.

When I was in junior high, everyone had to take either home economics or shop. Two boys chose to take home ec with the girls and a few girls took shop with the boys. Personally, I think all kids should be taking both, but not the types of classes I took. We learned how to bake pies and make meringue as well as how to sew a skirt and handbag as well as darning socks (none of which are of use in this day and age - who darns socks anymore?). I think that these types of skills aren't as useful as teaching kids basic clothing mending (sewing a button, hemming pants, and repairing rips). Instead of making pies (which is handy, but not that valuable), basic cooking skills like how to properly cook an egg, balance the nutrition of a meal, and how to tell if meat is safely cooked without overcooking would be much more useful. Likewise, in shop, basic home repair functions like fixing a running toilet, unclogging a drain, cleaning ventilation areas, and installing spot insulation would be more useful than building bird houses or making metal sculptures (as kids did at my school).

I think that given the number of two-income families and the lack of emphasis on domestic skills, it'd be great to just create a curriculum based on what people can use in their daily lives in all areas rather than to focus on spot aspects of either shop or home economics.

I regret that I did not have a home ec class. I'm 29 and just now learning to cook (I grew up with ready-made foods and lots of restaurants), and I still can't sew on a button by myself without it being a total mess. I think a home ec class should be a requirement for females and males in high school. If we are trying to prepare them for the world, cooking and other basic home tasks are necessities.

There's no way it's going to happen. Courses such as home ec, shop, and art have really been cut back due to NCLB, and they're chipping away minutes from subjects other than math and language arts. I had a full year of home ec in 7th grade. My kids get about a 9 week rotation each of sewing, cooking, and shop over 6th and 7th grade. The cooking is very much focused on basics such as food safety, microwave use, etc. Sewing had a lot of basics as well, but the projects...well, let's just say my son decided to let his grade take a hit and skip sewing the heart-shaped pin cushion.

Don't even get me started on shop. They couldn't hammer nails into wood due to liability issues.

Our state has a requirement that all kids take some type of consumer ed or personal finance class in high school. I think the content is very practical.

What sweet posts. I've often said that many of the things I know about construction (home-building and sculpture) are from my Home Ec roots.

I guess it could be a good idea, if done constructively. My mom had me skip home ec, and I took shop, which was much more useful. The things that they did in my jr high home ec class (like slice & bake cookies, wrap-around skirts - yes, it was the 70s), I'd been doing with my mom since I could reach a table. She didn't think that there'd be much value in taking that class.

In shop, we had all kinds of great machines to work on and materials to create things with. I think I still have the letter opener that we made using molds and hot, molten plastic.

A friend of mine is 33 and can't cook--all of his meals are microwaved, from the toaster oven, or take-out. He never learned at home and then he was in the military for six years so he never had to cook for himself. He didn't pick it up in college life either.

Home ec could have helped.

For the people that learn to cook/sew buttons/hem pants/balance a budget at home, this class will seem boring. To everyone else, it would be EXTREMELY useful.

I want it required in junior high or high school.

My high school did require that we all take CPR and First Aid, though. That was good.

I'm 27; when I was in middle school (grades 7-8) in Oregon, we were required to take 1 semester of home ec and 1 semester of shop. In high school, we were required to take 1 semester of economics that focused primarily on personal financial skills. I think these classes were a great introduction to a variety of life skills. I don't know how closely my home ec modeled the old 1950s stereotype, but teaching us basic cooking skills and food information was invaluable, not to mention some basic sewing, and how to use tools and machinery in shop class.

My old school district is fortunate enough to be funded and have a lot of invested parents even now; despite the hyperfocus on testing and results, "extra" classes like the arts and home ec have not yet been cut from the curriculum.

The small bits of Home Ec I was offered in middle and high school were hands down the most valuable classes I took.

The lack of "life skills" teaching that goes on in public schools is one of many reasons we chose to home school our own children.

A vote a resounding YES! Part of the problem with unhealthy eating and obesity is that people don't know how to cook any more and most people rarely cook from scratch (which is not that hard, if you pick the right techniques).

Home Ec (called "Family and Consumer Sciences" by the time I was in middle school) was where I learned to sew on a button, whip stitch, brown hamburger, and how to read a nutrition label. That's about all I remember, but clearly those are all very useful skills!

I think it could definitely be modernized and made more appropriate for modern consumption. Although I think the "Economics" part should be kept in! Keeping house is hard and shopping on a budget is hard, too.

I am almost positive home ec is still offered in schools. It's just not mandatory.

My 24 year old roommate (I'm 25) has asked me to show her how to make scrambled eggs and to sew a button on a pair of pants. My older brother taught himself to make over easy eggs when he was 5.

I have been thinking about this so much lately. My mother-in-law is one of the best budgeters I know and she credits her Home Ec class - which she took for three years - with this and her ability to cook, sew, clean and overall manage a household (while working full-time, of course). I wish it had been required. Shop was on the curriculum, but it was phased out by the time I left high school. That would have been another useful class. Bring them back, most definitely.

in middle school both boys and girls rotated through sewing, cooking, woodworking and metal working. I don't know that I learned much in cooking, but I was already baking at home.

I took a co-ed home economics class in junior high. While the cooking skills weren't especially helpful (my sister and I both had to help fix family meals during the summer--it was part of our chores) the one skill I was especially grateful for was learning the proper way to hand wash dishes. (Especially the idea of washing glasses/stemware first, pots last.) It's such a little thing, but so important!

it should be available, but a lot of home ec teachers are sadly sub par. Thank goodness it was an elective and I switched into an anatomy course because I would have died of boredom.

I have sewn and cooked since i was young, so boiling mac and cheese at school and sewing on a button would have wasted my time.

You should be able to test out of home ec ;)

I probably took home ec because I remember it was a required course in jr high - but really I just remember the finance part. Maybe cooking wasn't something they trusted 12-14 year olds with? I didn't take it in HS mostly because I was anorexic, and I knew it did involve food and eating.

However, my HS had a bunch of sewing classes in the art department and I took a lot of fiber arts classes. So while I can sew and follow a pattern I really took more classes on crochet, doll making, and quilting.

I think that home ec, or at least basic finance, sewing, and cooking classes are important. My BF took it and still doesn't know how to make anything more than ramen. My little brother is currently in HS still and he took home ec because it is still required to graduate HS: they made brownies, mac and cheese from the box, and a pillow. So while I think it's important I also wish they would focus more on nutritional meals. A lot of my friends, and my little brother and his group of friends, seem to have this idea that making food that does not come from a box is A) very difficult, B) requires more skill than a home cook has, and C) messy and time consuming. So cooking skills are important but shouldn't these classes be about actually cooking? How hard is even a homemade not from the box version of mac and cheese? Instead of brownies maybe making a basic bread? I'm not sure we're doing kids any favors by using this learning time to show them how to avoid cooking and to make bad food choices.

I still remember my 7th grade home ec teacher, Mrs. Wise (my shop teacher was named Mr. Power; yes, the irony...).

We did cooking and sewing; muffins (don't over-stir!!); Waldorf salad (at the time, I couldn't get over the combo of grapes and mayo); home-made mac and cheese...

By the time I was 14, I was making 6 layer tortes with true French buttercream and layers of dacquoise, so I think the start in basic principles did me good.

Home Ec and life skills, taught by a passionate and dedicated teacher, would be invaluable for kids. Sadly, our schools no longer have courses such as these, so I have to make sure to instruct my kids well at home.

...and yes, those are peaked, over-beat muffins that are being critiqued in the picture above (Mrs. Wise taught me well).

I took home ec in jr high- it was broken down into smaller length classes and included the lovely family/sex ed/child dev unit that we uncomfortably sat through.... My middle school age kids have it too- though it's set up a little differently. Every quarter of their 3 yrs of jr high they rotate between computers, IT, FACS (family and consumer science, AKA home ec) and health. Grade 6 is sewing and their big project is to sew a pillow, grade 7 is cooking and so far my son is pretty good a making cookies, puppy chow, caramel corn (not sure if his peers will be surviving off those skills- thankfully, he often cooks dinner with me so I know he'll be ok) and grade 8 is the child care unit... I do think it needs to be a part of high school too* maybe combined with personal finance (a quarter of each: IT,FACS, Personal finance, health)- I think we can skip the computers since kids are usually more tech-saavy than adults!

Hm, when I was in 7th grade in the mid-nineties in Ontario, we all had to take a half year of "family studies" and a half year of shop, and then later on in 9th grade we had a "skills for success" course of which about a third was health and family studies. I didn't find the family studies portion hugely useful in either case - we made pizza and sewed a pair of boxer shorts in 7th grade, but the teacher didn't actually bother to demonstrate how to do those things effectively, and if you didn't get it during the one project, you didn't get another chance. (Shop was fun, though. Even if I've never had occasion to use a lathe since then!)

I would love to see home ec taught more effectively and consistently, despite my own experience with the course.

It's still taught in high schools in Utah. It's called Foods. The advanced class is called ProStart and has competitions like Iron Chef. Sewing is now Fashion. Students make their own clothes.

I wasn't interested in those things at all in high school, and now I would love to go back and take the home ec course (minus the required week that the kids had to spend with those creepy baby dolls that cry and have to be held and changed and stuff).

I took shop instead, and while I have a really cool end table to show for it, it would have been fun to do some cooking and sewing.

I completely agree, my class was co-ed as well and it should be required. We learned cooking and baking, cleaning, sewing and nutrition. We also had Technical Arts classes where we learned about engines, (we took apart a lawn mower engine) and circuit boards. How many parents have the time or patience to teach their kids these things these days?

I do think it's important to offer basic finance, sewing, and cooking classes, as pixiewithsticks says, but as that commenter also says, home ec curriculum (I suppose like a lot of curriculum) needs to be revamped. I took home ec, and while the cooking portion was a bit of a waste, where we learned to make semi-homemade dishes like Jell-O poke cake (which I did think was delicious, but didn't really teach me much about baking), the sewing section resulted in a, for me, complicated skort with pleats. But, of course, even in the sewing section, we got to pick our own projects, so you had students making extremely simple pillows. Finance, at least as I recall, was not part of the curriculum.

I find it especially sad and frustrating that a lot of people don't know how to cook. My Dad can grill, make mashed potatoes, and aside from that, it's all about adding extra spices to canned soups or baking frozen Mexican food and pizzas. Cooking is usually as simple as following directions, and some of those directions yield a tasty meal in less time than you have to wait for a frozen Stouffer's lasagna to bake in the oven.

By the way, I was able to take shop, too (I think that in junior high we had one semester of home ec and one of shop, and neither was elective). While I really did love shop and think that those skills are valuable, some of the home ec skills are indispensable. In addition, most of us can afford to buy a few knives and pans for the cost of a table saw or compound miter saw. And you can a lot more with a few knives and pans than with one saw. (Maybe shop should have focused more on hand tools.)

I'm 28 and attended public school in PA. When I was in middle school 6th and 7th graders were required to take home ec as part of a rotating elective course period. The other courses included art, shop, music, drama and foreign language. I loved home ec, and still remember making french toast and quesadillas, and being thrilled to make the dishes for my parents and show off my new skills.

HS was a bit different - we had a large catalog of electives to pick from, and I think we had two electives per day which switched after the first semester - so 4 per year. I chose to take two home ec courses (baking and sewing) and have fond memories of both. I would have signed up for more - but my school had some pretty irresistable art classes.

I would LOVE it. In fact, I would love to teach it. My home ec teacher in Jr. High was such a psycho she made home ec seem like the worst thing in the world. Today, home ec is my favorite past time! Weird what growing up can do.

Kids need to know basic skills. And we need to make it interesting and cool. Especially since I know some almost 30 year olds that don't even know how to plunge a toilet or do laundry.

Yup, took in middle school in the 70s (and shop, both required of all students). My school district also had mandatory music class, art class, and in high school you were required to take a second language. Phys ed was daily. And oh yes, I also had to walk there one mile in the snow.

I am old.

I think home ec is a potentially great class for all students and if I ruled the world I'd add how to do a basic budget and balance a checkbook to some basic cooking and sewing lessons.

I am "old", so when I was in Junior High (not middle school) girls were required to take home ec, boys were required to take shop, and neither could take the other. At least as it was taught in my school, home ec was worthless. I lived in a farming community and most of the girls knew how to cook and sew, and things like budgeting weren't taught then. So home ec, which had us making hot cocoa and sewing an apron, seemed pretty pointless.

I do think that things like budgeting, basic cooking, decent meal planning, etc. seem to be a set of skills many people are not getting today and there may be a place for this kind of training in schools.

We had home ec - it was required in junior high, but an elective in high school.

I think it would be a great idea to bring it back in a modernized version. Not just teaching teenagers how to cook healthy meals, but also how to do DIY projects, how to can, how to garden, etc. I feel like in the last 20 years or so, we've moved away from knowing how to be self-sufficient and there's a renewed interest in those areas. It's satisfying to do a lot of your own things, but it also saves money. I think today's teenagers don't quite know how to be frugal because they've watched their parents pay someone else to do it.

I teach high school. I know that some schools still have home ec ("family and consumer sciences") but not all.

I also know from talking with my students that many of them would LOVE the chance to learn the things taught in that class. Many of them ask me questions about cooking, how to eat right, even how to sew and knit ('cause they have all seen my projects).

As for me, I never took home ec in school. I already knew how to do everything that they taught me thanks to my awesome mother. Instead I took industrial tech with the boys and built rockets and learned about hydraulics systems and played with power tools.

I think Home Ec and Shop should be mandatory for all kids, regardless of gender. I remembering being completely appalled by how many of my friends in college didn't have even the simplest cooking skills, or who were completely stymied by basic household skills like balancing a checkbook.

My sisters and I were lucky enough to have parents who insisted we learn how to cook and sew, use tools, handle our finances, and do basic car and house maintenance. But there are far too many kids who aren't lucky enough to get that kind of education at home. How can we expect them to make good choices as adults if they're never taught how?

I totally think there should be more emphasis on home-ec, as well as woodshop and all of those classes which school don't provide anymore. If we aren't getting the life-skills from school, where do they expect our children to get them?

I learned everything I know from my parents, but their generation had all of these classes available to them. What is going to happen to the next generation? I definitely think there is a need for more 'back to basics' classes...after all, how many times in our life are we going to use social studies and 10th grade history? Never, really. How many times are we going to cook, or need to patch a hole in the drywall? More times that I can count. Our schools are just shoving needless information into our heads and not really teaching life skills anymore...and that's what we need!

We didn't have Home Economics. We had several courses that covered the basics though- cooking, fashion, adolescent psychology and families in society (the last two were sociology courses).
Cooking was an awesomely fun class, usually devoid of over-achievers, but a fair mix of folks were in it none the less. We had chefs who were grads of the highschool come in to talk to us, and there was even a district internship program where you could travel to Italy to study. My favorite part was that we got to make food from all around the world, and in the last class we got to cook a whole meal in a small group from a specific region all by ourselves. It was then that I learned the joys and horrors of baklava.

Oh, and in elementary school, we had both sewing and shop, both of which were mandatory for everyone. Shope rocked, sewing was taught by someone who should have retired a decade earlier. She believed that boys were incapable of mending their own clothes, and so finished all their projects for them and gave them A's. Useless.

Home Ec was a half-year mandatory class in my middle school, paired up with a half-year of wood shop and computer drafting...Actually, while wood shop was not my favorite, Home-Ec was the only place I've ever successfully made crepes....or sewn anything with a hidden zipper correctly...they also taught us laundry care, which was very beneficial.

If I could revamp the curriculum (oh to dream!), kids would all get shop, cooking/gardening, finance and home care and lastly, CIVICS, where they'd learn about local government, how to vote, how to research politics, what kinds of services and non profits were in the city, read local papers and talk about current events. All real live skills that someone could use striking out on their own at 18, instead of memorizing who invented the cotton gin and learning calculus. No offense to you Eli Whitney, but I'd rather everyone could use basil they grew on their handmade pasta by the light of a lamp they rewired, while they balance the checkbook and read about the vote at the school board.

I took home ec in middle school and found it to be worthless as far as I was concerned.
It's a very valuable class as far as the average student goes, but while these kids weren't beyond toasting bread, I was off doing something much more worthwhile (and healthy).

I believe that a true life skills curriculum is essential to build a well-rounded adult...and that there doesn't need to be such an "either academics or technical education" mentality. Cooking IS nutrition, biology,chemistry, physics, math and art; sewing and fiber work is geometry and art..you get the drift.

Furthermore, people learn much more successfully (better retention for a longer time) when concepts and skills are learned in a relevant context and then practiced.

We need WHOLE curriculum!

I never took home ec in middle school or high school. Instead, middle school focused on sex ed and high school...I didnt have the option to take any fun electives because my schedule was filled with AP classes/sports. The only required elective in high school was a driver's ed/personal finance/family planning course for 1 year. Learning to drive was helpful, but all the other 2 courses taught me was that adult life is expensive (depressing lesson as a teenager anxious to become an adult!).

I dont understand how some people need home ec to learn how to cook. Since most commenters have said they made basic things like cakes/mac n cheese, all that is required is knowing how to read. I understand not having a family member to teach you slightly more advanced cooking skills, but all I had in guidance was a recipe card my mom gave me, and I can cook. I suspect that some of the people in their 30s who "dont know how" are really "too lazy/uninspired to try." Especially with all the guidance available on the internet/books.

Everyone had to take both home ec and shop when I was in school. I remember that for the students who'd never cooked before, the class was incredibly informative. Sadly for me, I never was able to get a good grade on a single sewing item. Just didn't take.

I do think home ec should be reintroduced into the schools. It gives some very basic and valuable life skills that are often no longer passed down from one generation to the next in the home.

Though I'd learned basic cooking skills from my mom (and sewing, too) by the time I was 13, I took home ec, anyway because the teacher (Mrs. G) always seemed like a lot of fun and I wanted another class instead of a study hall. I'm not sure I learned much more than I already knew, though my sewing skills were definitely rusty then, but I learned a lot of things that weren't part of the lesson plans--like why it's important to taste batters before you bake them (even though tasting them was against the rules--there was an instance of someone filling the sugar jars with laundry detergent, caught before baking because someone tasted their batter).

Also, when I was a teacher, I think Home Ec (called something else then) was required for all jr. high students. Ridiculously, the kids learned that it was more dangerous to cut food with a dull knife than a sharp knife--but the home ec teacher wasn't allowed to sharpen the knives.

I'm all in favor of home ec being taught in schools--especially if it's allowed to be taught well and properly (sharp knives and all).

im currently in my second year of college but i wish that when i was in high school we had home ec. i like cooking and sewing (which im horrible at) and i wanted to learn but i had no resources to learn from for what i wanted to learn in cooking . i think i would be really great for home ec to back in high school. all the cooking ive learned so far is from watching food network and trying out recipes which sometimes just dont taste right haha . im all in for home ec

I think if we had a REAL Home Ec. course (not like the one I had in middle school- we learned how to make cinnamon rolls out of Pillsbury crescents), we could drastically cut down on the obesity epidemic. People of my generation are overweight because so many have no idea how to cook! Our parents were raised by tired housewives who welcomed T.V. dinners with open arms, so they never learned real cooking from their mothers or fathers. Not to mention, most of us were raised by single mothers who didn't have time to spend an hour or two making a nice, home-cooked meal every night, or even a few times a week. As someone who was raised in a poverty-ridden area, I know for a fact that knowledge about food (and cleaning, general homemaking skills) could have made a huge impact on my health at an early age.
It should be a required class for both sexes, in my opinion.

My daughter had a foods and wellness class in high school two years ago. It was only one semester but she had fun telling me all about the different tools ( the difference between a spatula and a pancake turner) and the foods they cooked. the boys tried to blow it off but the teacher told them if they did she would give them an F. They had to clean as they went and not act helpless. She wishes she could take it again as they got to take the food they cooked on to the next class. Both teacher of the next class and current boyfriend got to eat good.

In junior high I had a mandatory cooking class; in high school I had a mandatory home ec class. In Cooking, we cooked. In the home ec class, we didn't cook, but I learned how to budget and how to write out a check (something my parents never taught me). Now, my boys take cooking, shop, and sewing (all separate classes). Reading the above posts, I'm feeling so grateful! I didn't realize that so many schools had cut these programs out. For some kids, these "life" skills are way more important than what they learn in math or science class.

I didn't take home ec...but I believe it should be a requirement. SO many people lack the skills when they are at home or out on their own to cook a proper meal.

I struggled for a long time with simple things like hard boiled eggs-which is a cooking basic. I wish I knew how to sew, etc, and all these skills are taught in home ec.

BRING IT BACK, I say!!!!

I graduated high school fairly recently (in this millenium, anyways) and home ec was a requirement for students in Vancouver. Every student takes a half year of tech ed (electronics and woodworking) and a half year of home ec (sewing and cooking) in grade 8. Then, between grades 10 and 11 you have to take 1 tech ed or home ec course again. So I took cooking twice in school. I'm really happy that we were required to take it, because the class became a relaxing and enjoyable part of my day at school and I definitely learned a lot about cooking basics from my classes.

I'm very glad that we still have these programs required! I didn't know that so many places had gotten rid of them. Then again, I live in Vancouver-I don't know how different the system is between the US and Canada.

HOME EC NEVER LEFT!! There is a major called Family and Consumer Sciences Education (which i teach) it is home ec, with a new name so that it doesn't relate to the oppression of women anymore. It is still a major and can be taught in schools many from k-12! Schools are cutting it now because of budget cuts! AAFCS.net!