My name francisca ochoa i am a student at job corps and i am interested in the cooking field.

Hi Francisca! I don't have any experience personally, but I married a family of chefs (lucky me!). My husband is a trained chef having attended the Culinary Institute of America. Most of his career was spent working his way up from dishwasher to training chef for a very well known personality chef. His hours were long and there were holidays and weekends but he was incredibly rewarded enough to consider it a payoff. He's currently a corporate chef which allows him a much better work-life balance but it didn't happen overnight. My stepson is a chef and just by his own will, interest and experimentation landed a job in a kitchen. He absorbs everything he can and is increasingly given more responsibility. He's a cook now at a high end establishment in Phoenix and although the hours are also many, he wouldn't trade it for anything. Hope that helps a little!

Hi Francisca

While I have not recruited for cooking or what’s referred to as culinary arts professionals I have learned that the best way to learn about a career is to go online and ask. 

This is what I have found so far.

There are one-year Certificate and Diploma programs provided by a school’s vocational track that teach the kitchen basics and move you to immediate work as a line cook or other types of kitchen staffer.

Getting and Associate's Degree (a two year program) is the most common educational path for Culinary Arts professionals. This degree requires you to take classes in English, math and communication.  You would also take classes in culinary principles, baking, nutrition, food safety,menu planning, and food purchasing 

An Associate’s or Bachelor’s might help you move your cooking career towards jobs like these.

A Chef-Average salary—$52,160 Top-end salary—$81,150 or more

Executive Chef-Manages the kitchen staff, prepares work schedules, creates menus, and computes food costs.

Sous Chef-Assists the Executive Chef in running the kitchen.

Banquet Chef-Manages the kitchen staff in quantity food production for banquets, conferences, and conventions.

Pastry Chef- Responsible for baking breads, pastries, and desserts. Note for bakery artists: Average salary—$28,660 Top-end salary—$40,350 or more

There are also Bachelor’s and Masters degree programs if you want to become a Master Chef which is the highest and most demanding level of achievement offered by the American Culinary Federation.

The sites below will give you more information about cooking careers and salaries for the different positions in the cooking/culinary field.

https://www.trade-schools.net/articles/careers-in-food.asp

https://study.com/articles/Careers_in_Cooking.html

https://www.culinaryschools.org/career-info/

There is more information out there that will tell you what people do in certain careers, other sites that might describe a typical day in the role, jobsites with openings and job descriptions as well as salary ranges for the positions, etc. YouTube may have videos explaining the same. If you look at multiple sites, look for consistencies in what they say. This should help you feel more comfortable that the information you are reading is accurate.

 Hope this helps. Feel free to reach back out.

Carol