Sharing an iCloud account I am setting up my parents with an Apple iPad.  I was wondering if I can configure it so that they share a single iCloud account for email, calendar, contacts, photo stream, FaceTime calls, etc.  Is there a better way than a shared iCloud account if I want them both to be able to use it and there is only 1 device?

I do not think the IOS on an iPad natively supports multiple user accounts like Mac OS X.
There is actually no other option (unless you want to do some more advanced stuff which probably shouldn't be done on a device you don't use yourself). There is one user (or more precisely one set of settings) on an iPad and you can configure one iCloud email/calendar etc account. You can have a separate account for iTunes and the App Store, but this is probably not what you are looking for.

OTOH, you may want to look into iCloud email aliases to give both your mother and your father individual email addresses. See the answers on Is it possible to have 2 iCloud email accounts in IOS 5? for details.