ROYAL CITY - Royal High School Family & Consumer Sciences Education (FCSE) instructor Kathy Schutz qualified for retirement five years ago, but she's not quitting any time soon.

"I love the people here. I love the staff and the students," Schutz said recently. "I'm having the kids of the kids coming through now."

"I like change," Schutz added. "Every day is a little different. You don't know which kid is going to be an issue or which kid is going to make your day happy."

Schutz grew up in Spokane, graduating from West Valley High School. She started studies at Eastern Washington State College with dreams of being a nurse.

"I had been involved with the Red Cross, and I was a candy striper at the old St. Luke's Hospital and Eastern State Hospital at Medical Lake," she said. "I worked as a nurse's aid while I went to college."

Schutz ended up in Home Ec, as FCSC was called then, because her general education included Home Ec classes. Those were food labs, interior decorating and clothing.

"I became attracted to it," she said.

Schutz's teaching career started in the town of Troy, a northwestern Montana logging community about the size of Royal City. She went there because there were few opportunities in Washington when she finished at EWSC.

Three years later, Schutz moved back to Washington and a job on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Two years after that, she started the 1979-80 school year at Royal.

"I came over the (Frenchman) hill, and it was green," Schutz said. "It kind of reminded me of the Spokane Valley."

Some things have changed during Schutz's career. To make room for emerging ideas, the career field has had name changes. It was Home Economics when she started, Home & Family Life when she came to Royal and, eventually, FCSE.

"It was cooking and sewing when I started," she said. "The name changed to make room for interior design and child development classes 30 years ago."

Today, the FCSE department includes required health classes. There are two classes over four semesters. Schutz comes into contact with just about every Royal High student at some point.

The FCSE department modernizes with the times. Clothing and Textiles students still sew, but not on their grandparents' machines. These are computerized, and students don't have to change parts to get a certain stitch. They just re-program.

Schutz is the Family, Career and Community Leaders of America (FCCLA) advisor. That student club was formerly known as Future Homemakers of America. It changed as women went from the kitchen to career lives.

A significant change, and the one Schutz likes the least, is a growing lack of respect for adults from young people. If it's not noticed around here, that's because school administrators and staff make an effort to instill respect.

"Young kids need to be reminded to be respectful," she said. "I remind them all the time."

Some things haven't changed in 37 years. Students have the same personal problems. In Troy, Schutz had to deal with a girl who was having her own father's child - for a second time.

"We continue to have a problem with teen pregnancy, more than we would like," Schutz said. "The good thing is that they can finish their education. Back in my day they weren't allowed to go to school."

A change Schutz particularly likes is the attitude toward food preparation. More and more young people are talking about careers as cooks and chefs.

Schutz envies the Moses Lake School District's culinary arts program, which includes an off-site cafe. She wishes Moses Lake would launch a skills center where other Grant County students could study.

Culinary arts would be tough to institute here. It would require the use of the school's commercial kitchen. It's too busy feeding students to make room for a culinary program.

Students can cook in the FCSE kitchen, and they can eat what they cook, but they can't serve it, Schutz said. So they don't get a feel for food service.

"Here it would be just cooking," she said.

Still, students who dream of food service careers can get a good start here. They can take advantage of one semester of Foods I and one semester of Foods II.

"In Foods II we teach specialty foods, including foreign foods," Schutz said.

One aspect of her foods classes that Schutz really appreciates is the help they can be to some students. She noted they prepare meals at home while their parents are still at work in the orchards and fields.

Schutz is able to help these students be safe in the kitchen and teach them healthful cooking and healthful living. They don't have to experiment at home and waste food or money.

"If something is not going to turn out well, I'd rather it not turn out well here," she said.