CARING CAREERS

A living and a life is what NMSU's family and consumer sciences department offers graduates. That philosophy is catching on.

This fall, the department welcomed 307 undergraduate and graduate students -- 19 percent of the College of Agriculture, Consumer and Environmental Sciences' enrollment. The department's undergraduate numbers are up 73 percent since 1991.

Students can choose helping careers and learn how to ease families through trying times, plan special diets for the elderly and keep teen moms in school. Or they can become savvy retail and business managers.

"Graduates are able to find satisfying jobs in this field," says Mary Ellen McKay, family and consumer sciences interim department head. "We also teach them a quality of life that's really important."

The department offers four study areas: clothing, textiles and fashion merchandising; family and child sciences; family and consumer sciences education; and human nutrition and food science. These programs are backed by supportive teachers who often become lifelong mentors and friends.

"We believe in hands-on advising and a lot of face-to-face interaction. For many students, it really does feel like home," McKay says.

A variety of students seek out that home, located on Gerald Thomas Hall's third floor. "We really have a high-quality, ethnically diverse student population," McKay says.

Of the juniors and seniors enrolled in fall 1996, about 40 percent were Hispanic, she says. African-Americans, Native Americans, Asians and international students made up almost another 10 percent.

Faculty, students and alumni alike are getting used to the department's new name. Until July 1997, it was known simply as the home economics department.

"For our students, the change to family and consumer sciences means they have a name on their degree that they can associate with more closely," McKay says. "This makes them more marketable and more closely reflects their course of study." That course varies quite a bit depending on the major, but students in the department take a variety of classes ranging from biology and chemistry to family dynamics and teaching methods.

In the clothing, textiles and fashion merchandising major, students take business classes, as well as classes dealing with clothing construction and even clothing and human behavior.

One clothing master's degree graduate, Amy Zahasky, works as an assistant cosmetics manager at Neiman Marcus in Las Vegas, Nev. She says many of the same management principles she learned in her fashion industry classes -- such as how to use formulas to stock retail -- apply to her work in cosmetics.

Zahasky says she also benefitted from hearing about the experiences of Roselyn Smitley, an associate professor in the department who has worked in the fashion industry. "What was the most helpful was listening to her explain how the industry really works and what to expect."

Even before they graduate, students can gain firsthand knowledge of the industry through internships, says Jane Hegland, an assistant professor in the department. Four undergraduate students did internships this semester at the Neiman Marcus store alone.

Family and child sciences majors are the largest group of students in the department. In the practicum for her master's degree in marriage and family therapy, Dedi Smith learned how to deal with pregnant teenagers and victims of domestic violence.

"We got one-on-one experience with clients, but we also had guidance and a safety net to discuss how we were handling our counseling sessions," she explains.

Emphasis on understanding: Robert DelCampo, an NMSU family and consumer sciences professor, makes family the focus of his lectures.

Smith found one exercise assigned by Professor Robert DelCampo to be both the most difficult and the most helpful. With clients' permission, students taped sessions and then had them critiqued in class. "This helped us build our counseling techniques, polish our skills and broaden our awareness of what it's like to be in a session," she says.

DelCampo says the major's strength is its emphasis on understanding the family as the basic unit in society. Classes like "Infant Development" and "The Aging Family" are offered to address the entire life cycle.

Mickey Curtis, clinical director of Families and Youth Inc. in Las Cruces, has found the department's graduates to be well-equipped to help parents deal with children at all ages-from the 3-year-old resisting potty training to the 15-year-old skipping school.

Families and Youth is a counseling agency for families with children at high risk for delinquency and behavior problems. Curtis says during the past seven years the agency has hired four master's-level graduates from the department as child and family therapists.

While some graduates are just starting out at places like Families and Youth, others have built lifelong careers on their family and consumer sciences backgrounds.

Twenty-five years after earning her bachelor's degree and 17 years after earning her master's, Beth Parker of Las Cruces has never regretted her decision to study home economics education at NMSU. "I got a really good background that was especially strong in clothing," she says.

During her career, Parker started a program that trained students to run a preschool for two hours each day at Gadsden High School near Anthony. Her teenage students learned how to provide their young charges with healthy snacks and interesting lessons and field trips.

For the past seven years, Parker has challenged herself with starting and improving the teen parents program known as GRADS (Graduation Reality and Dual-role Skills) at San Andres High School in Mesilla.

"We noticed that too many teen parents were not coming to school," Parker said. "With this alternative setting, I work hard on improving their self-esteem every day, trying to keep them in school. I tell them, 'You can do this.'"

Parker tries to model good parenting techniques as she interacts with teens and their children-many of whom attend the day-care adjacent to her classroom.

Merrilyn Cummings, a professor in the department, says jobs abound for well-trained family and consumer sciences teachers like Parker. Besides working in middle and high schools, graduates can teach at community colleges and in extension service offices.

Cummings cites a recent study that indicates demand will be four times as great as the number of undergraduates preparing for family and consumer sciences education careers by the year 2000.

Jobs also are plentiful for students majoring in human nutrition and food science. Graduates work in dietetics, sports nutrition, food safety and product development, says Ann Bock, a professor in the department.

One graduate, Laura Duran, works as a dietitian at Bienvivir Senior Health Services, a day center for the elderly in El Paso, Texas. "The advanced nutrition, diet therapy and biochemistry classes really put it all together for me," she says.

Modeling healthy choices: Laura Duran (right), a graduate of NMSU's human nutrition and food science program, uses food models to help Bertha Lopez balance her diet. Duran is a dietitian at Bienvivir Senior Health Services of El Paso, Texas.

Duran adds that the breadth of training she received in other family and consumer sciences areas has had an impact on her ability to evaluate and oversee the dietary needs of her 283 clients. "At Bienvivir, we don't just look at medical charts, we really get involved with the families, too," she says.

One class Duran had with Cummings -- "Teaching in Informal Settings" -- has been invaluable for the nutrition education aspect of her job. "I learned how to give presentations and keep audiences excited and motivated."

Perhaps more than in any other major, graduates with human nutrition and food science degrees learn a healthy way of life, along with skills for successful careers.

Call 1-800-EAT-COOL, and Alex Martinez of Albuquerque may answer. He has worked as a food program specialist with New Mexico's Children, Youth and Families Department, administering a federal nutrition program at child care centers and home day-care sites.

"My degree in nutrition got me in the door and showed I was responsive and a quick learner," he says.

But like other graduates, Martinez is discovering that his family and consumer sciences degree means more than just a good living. It also means a good life. "I promote lifestyle changes that I'm trying to do myself."