In one corner, a group of students fries mozzarella sticks. In another, the stovetop bubbles with boiling water for macaroni. On the countertop, the blender whirs with ingredients for a smoothie.

The students are busy making simple dishes to get some basic kitchen skills, said Morgan Baker, the family and consumer science teacher for Conant Middle High School. It’s part of the school’s Intro to Cooking class, which eventually leads to Advanced Cooking. He said many students don’t want to stop there.

“Demand is high,” Baker said. “We had some kids wanting to take the same class twice; they wanted to learn more so much.”

Culinary arts was the leading request when students were surveyed about what programs they might like to see in an expanded Career and Technical Education Center, an addition that is on the ballot March 11. The addition would include facilities for public safety, a larger space for the existing building trades program and a culinary arts program with an industrial kitchen and a dining area.

While Jaffrey-Rindge has the option to tuition students outside of the district to schools that have a more-extensive culinary arts program, those seats are few and far between, Baker said.

Conant expanded its consumer science program, upgrading its kitchen space to the current configuration, in 2017, and that space will remain in use for regular consumer science classes. The new addition would have expanded facilities with the focus on a career in culinary arts, rather than teaching the life skill of cooking. 

A high demand

In a student survey conducted in 2023 of 137 students, 60.6% indicated they were interested in taking classes in a culinary arts track.

Kim Baker, director of school counseling at Conant, said it’s a popular choice at Conant and other schools. When students have taken what Conant has to offer and are interested in more, the district can attempt to get them into programs in Keene or Milford, but she said those seats are perpetually full with their own students. 

“They’re asking for more,” she said.

Morgan Baker said he knows of at least two graduates in recent years who will be pursuing careers in cooking, though on very different tracks. One was accepted into Johnson & Wales University, which is well known for its culinary program, and the other is joining the Army with the goal of working as a cook.

“There are a lot of job prospects. Too many jobs, and not enough cooks. And there are just a lot who are interested,” Morgan Baker said. “Students realize this is a life skill.”

Food service and restaurant work is a large segment of New Hampshire’s economy. In 2023, food preparation and serving-related occupations (including waiters and bartenders) made up about 56,380 positions, or 8.4% of all people employed in the state, which makes it the third-largest sector.

According to labor market projections for 2026 in a presentation that the district is using about the proposed CTE expansion, there will be about 18,000 culinary arts openings in Hillsborough County and about 3,000 openings in Cheshire County.

Teaching life skills and more

Students who are taking cooking courses do so in the consumer science classroom – set up with stove and countertop spaces to mimic the average kitchen. It shares space with tables and storage for the consumer science program.

During a recent School Board session, one resident questioned whether a CTE program could be developed using the current space. Morgan Baker said that the room was designed to teach home cooking – a very different endeavor from commercial cooking.

The proposed addition to Conant Middle High School proposes a commercial kitchen and dining area where members of the public can be served restaurant-style, giving students the entire breadth of experience of working in a commercial kitchen. It also can be used for catering. 

That’s the kind of real-world experience that the current setup would not allow for, Morgan Baker said.

“Learning the kind of cooking you do at home can only get you so far,” he said. “I am limited in my time and my space.”

According to Morgan Baker, the plan for the culinary program would be to instruct students “on everything, from serving food to cooking it.”

“The students will be in charge of running the restaurant,” he stated. “Choosing the menu, designing the menu, the different aspects of running a business (with support of course), managing inventory, the differences between home cooking and professional kitchens. Everything from the basics of knife work to higher level skills of pastry-making.”

Morgan Baker said he understands that for many people, money is tight, but a program like a full culinary arts track provides not only highly in-demand job skills, but highly transferable life skills.

“To sound a bit sappy, cooking is a skill that will never not be needed,” he said. “Everyone should be independent. If they can go out and make their own food and survive, that’s the way to make sure they can survive and thrive.”

If approved, the addition would create a total of 54 seats for a culinary arts program. It would include three year-long courses, with approximately 18 to 24 students completing the entire course each year. It would include the addition of one instructor to the district’s staff. 

According to the Career and Technical Education agreement between Jaffrey-Rindge, Mascenic and ConVal school districts, students can take any program offered in any of the schools, though 75% of seats are reserved for students of the district where the program is housed. 

Keene’s model

Richard Towne, the CTE director for the Cheshire Career Center in the Keene School District, said the proposed addition is a similar setup to Keene’s culinary arts program, which also opens a restaurant for a few hours three days a week that is open to the public and allows students the opportunity to work in a real-life setting.

The Keene program mixes in students at different levels in running the restaurant. which Towne said replicates a commercial kitchen which might have prep cooks and chefs. Some students start as sophomores, and as seniors, they enter the community to work for restaurants as part of their credits. These students are graduating with college credits and food-handling certifications that make them immediately hireable, Towne said.

“It’s very popular,” said Towne, who said in the most-recent year, there had to be a lottery system for seats in the program because of the high demand. “Students can see the immediate benefits, and it lets them get a head start in the culinary world. They’re employable right away.”

Towne said building from the ground up would give Jaffrey-Rindge an advantage in making a separate entrance for the dining area, which could be controlled. The Cheshire program was started in the 1970s, and he said there’s no direct access to the restaurant, despite it being open to the public. 

Towne also recommended the program use a paraprofessional in addition to the instructor, noting that it is the model Keene uses. It allows the main instructor to focus on the bigger program elements while the paraprofessional can assist with carrying out the chef’s orders. 

“It’s an amazing program, and the kids really benefit, and they really like it,” Towne said. 

Securing funding

The total project cost for the new addition is expected to be $22.9 million. The district is anticipating receiving state grant funding of about $16 million for the project, leaving the remaining $6.8 million on the warrant on March 11 for a bond. Because the vote is for a bond, it requires three-fifths majority vote to pass.

Of the total cost, about $2 million would be for site development, $15.2 million for construction, $1.2 million for design and engineering, $1.5 million for furniture, equipment and services, including about $1 million in new equipment for the programs; and $2.6 million for contingencies.

The proposed project relies on a cycle of state funding specifically designated for career and technical education funding. The state is expected to provide 75% of funding on allowable costs, including the construction of the addition. Because not every cost is covered, including site work, the state is expected to cover about 67% of the project.

Whether that funding would be available or cover the entire 75% of cost was up in the air for much of this project, but that process has taken a step forward. The budget proposed by Gov. Kelly Ayotte includes the full cost for funding the CTE renovation, allowing up to approximately $18.5 million. It is the only career and technical education project that is currently in the budget proposal. The budget has yet to be approved by the state House of Representatives and Senate.

Jaffrey-Rindge School Board Chair Chris Ratcliffe said this is a positive step for the district.

“Based on this fact, the governor's expressed support of CTE programs, and the state's history of funding all locally approved CTE projects at the 75% level, we are hopeful that the money will be available in the final approved budget,” Ratcliffe said. 

It is also a one-time shot, he added, saying the district isn’t likely to see this kind of state funding again, at least for many years, and that “there is no path forward if the state funding is not provided.”

Ashley Saari can be reached at 603-924-7172, Ext. 244, or asaari@ledgertranscript.com. She’s on X @AshleySaariMLT.