Long ago we used to have a devoted legion of homemakers. They were all women.  Eventually, a revolution occurred that allowed women to leave the role of home maker and pursue careers or fulfilling lives outside of the home.  Due to recent trends, home makers are making a comeback, but now home makers are both men and women.  Often, one of the parents is the home maker and sometimes its hired help.  In any case we have a legion of untrained, unprepared home makers.  Many of these people think Kraft Mac and Cheese is a major part of the food pyramid.  Our home makers need education.

Why Educate in a College

Education is important for every person.  People that choose to stay at home are no different.  There is so much to learn about cooking, cleaning, finances, nutrition, first aid, and much more.  Being a homemaker requires you to be good at a whole lot of things.  Currently, we are basically telling people that either your parents should have taught you all the skills you need, or you should just learn them on your own.  The first problem with this is that we have a generation of people that were raised in daycare facilities with diets of frozen entrees or fast food.  These individuals were never taught by their parents.  The second problem is that when people learn these skills on their own, they usually fail to do it properly.

Curriculum

A university could easily populate a two or four year curriculum based on the most important things a home maker should learn, complete with core requirements and electives.  I believe a student would have to pick a particular specialty.  So you could have a BS in homemaking with an emphasis or minor in the culinary arts, or a minor in first aid, etc.   There would definitely be classes for finance, first aid, nutrition, and health.  Electives could vary widely from auto mechanic classes to plumbing to sewing.

Benefits

The benefits of a program like this would be infinite.  First and foremost it would give the home makers a sense of accomplishment.  A degree would validate many people’s lives and give them a definitive identity.  They would no longer have to field questions of why they gave up the college opportunity.  Secondly, I believe that having a well trained home maker would improve the economy as whole.  A well oiled machine at home will reduce the worries for children and professional adults.  It would allow the children to get a better education, and the working parent to worry less about home and more about work.  This would be good for everyone.

Finally, imagine the difference for our health care system if every household had a parent with some medical knowledge. We would see far fewer children being brought to the doctor for minor injuries and colds. If every household had a parent that was educated in nutrition the U.S. would have far less diabetes and obesity.

Universities around the world really need to start thinking about more fields of study than what they currently have.  They need to step out of the box and realize that a quality education can help everyone.  We all need to realize that a wonderful homemaker can make every family members life better.