High School Hosts ‘Adulting Day’ To Teach Students How To Cook, Clean, And Change A Tire

College-Ready and Life-Ready

It’s not uncommon to end up in your mid-20s and wonder why you’re missing everyday skills and how you got there. As helpful as Google and YouTube are, it would be nice to enter adulthood knowing how to set a budget, wash your delicates, and boil an egg without having to look it up. One high school is remedying this for their students with an “Adulting Day”.

Lumpkin County High School in Georgia wants to teach its students life skills before they actually need them. Principal Billy Kirk believes that it’s important to teach both academics and practical skills to prepare students for graduation.

“We’re trying to teach kids real-life examples. So when they graduate, not only are they college-ready, but they’re life-ready,” Kirk told WSB-TV 2 in Atlanta.

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‘Adulting Day’ at High School

And students were appreciative of the opportunity to learn these skills. Senior Grace Wikle is an accomplished student who is arguably college-ready. She has taken three Advanced Placement courses, for which students can earn college credit, as well as five classes at the local college.

But when it comes to a skill like changing a tire, Wikle said that she wouldn’t have known what to do before her school’s Adulting Day. If she had gotten a flat tire on the way to school, she would have had to call someone to come help her.

“[I’d] call somebody else, call my parents, whoever is on the side of the road. I was not prepared before today,” Wikle told WSB-TV.

Part of Principal Kirk’s motivation for hosting Adulting Day is that his own kids also needed to learn the skills to be independent adults.  “I have two boys who go to this school. [They are] 18 and 17. I’m embarrassed to say if my kids got stuck in the rain today with a flat tire, they probably wouldn’t know how to fix it,” Principal Kirk said.

On Adulting Day, Kirk invited professionals to teach the students a variety of skills, from performing CPR to cooking chicken. The professionals included cooks, plumbers, electricians, and mechanics.

Students acknowledged that they have resources like YouTube where they can look up how to perform these tasks. But they believed that it was more effective for them to learn the skills hands-on from a professional during Adulting Day.

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Who Should Teach ‘Adulting’ Skills?

It might seem extreme for the school to take an entire day to teach basic skills to its students. And it raises the question of who is responsible for teaching kids how to change a tire and iron a shirt.

Some might say that parents should be the ones showing their children how to do these things. And it might be ideal for students to learn “adulting” skills from their parents. But not all families have the time and space to teach them. And many high school students are overbooked with academics, sports, and extracurricular activities.

No matter who you think should be stepping up to the plate, it seems that Lumpkin County High School’s Adulting Day was a success. Its students will graduate prepared to take on the world. And if there’s something they don’t know how to do, they can always consult YouTube.

*Article originally appeared at Healthy Holistic Living. Reposted with permission.