Share this page 

Baking AQ Highlights Tech Education

To Marie Poss, OCT, Fanshawe College has just the right ingredients to offer a new AQ called Teaching Hospitality and Tourism — Baking.

Photo: Matthew Plexman

Photo of two adults dressed in chef attire. One is using a spoon to stir contents in a saucepan.

"In the college realm, this is our expertise," says Poss, a professor and co-ordinator of the Early Childhood Education program at Fanshawe in London, Ont. "We have the labs, the materials, the relevant experts, and the application skill set. It's a seamless transition to be able to offer these AQs."

The baking AQ, to run for the first time this summer, highlights the effort to fill a need for technological education teachers, and draws on what colleges do best.

This Schedule F course offers an opportunity to learn in a hands-on, bake lab environment, and develop new lesson plans for bake-specific teaching units. The course includes 90 hours in class and 35 hours online.

In 2018, the Ontario College of Teachers accredited a consortium of six colleges to offer Schedule C, D and F Additional Qualification courses: Fanshawe College, Collège Boréal, Canadore College, Conestoga College, Mohawk College and Niagara College.

The Ontario Council for Technology Education also strongly endorses the delivery of the Schedule F courses by the consortium. Tracy Gedies, dean of the faculty of creative industries at Fanshawe College, notes that this benefits the entire system. It encourages collaboration across all levels of education, exposes more teachers to the college system and programming, fosters professional currency, activates hands-on learning — all while meeting College guidelines. For secondary schools, the consortium promotes students' interests in technological education and helps ensure that skilled practitioners teach the subject. That last point is especially important at a time of a growing gap for skilled tradespeople in Ontario.

Poss has also developed and led Fanshawe's first AQ, Kindergarten, Part 1. The subject matter wasn't quite baking or another technology subject. Still, she says, no matter the course, the colleges offer a wealth of tangible activities and interactions that bring the subject matter to life. That's their wheelhouse.

"The opportunity to bring the expertise of the colleges to the table is a really exciting movement," Poss says.