The life skills class recently baked and packaged homemade dog treats, and they are now looking to sell the baked goods to the community.

This class has completed projects with a similar end goal in mind over the past couple of years to prepare students for the world outside of high school.

“[For the dog treats], I wanted to find a hands-on experience where it applies math skills through measuring, reading, and following directions, while also creating a product that they can be proud of. The purpose of the life skills class is to really get our students ready for society,” Brittany Yates, life skills teacher, said.

To ensure that the finished sweets were the best products possible and that everyone in the life skills class was equally involved with the treat-making process, everyone was assigned their own unique role, Yates says.

“Everybody has a different role,” Yates said. “We have a manager of the month, and that person is in charge of taking all our supplies down from the cabinet and assigning the other roles. We have two chefs that follow our cooking directions and someone who is in charge of packaging. Another person is in charge of keeping time and cleaning up, while someone else checks the inventory to make sure [the class] has enough ingredients.”

As the role of measurer for the dog treats, Amanda Niemi, freshman, says she was very glad with how the treats turned out.

“I liked making [the dog treats]. “[The dough] was very squishy and soft,” Niemi said with a large grin. “I really liked the finished product.”

According to Yates, after the baking and wrapping was completed, the teachers discussed who the dog treats would be sold to and how the treats were going to be distributed.

“We are planning to start with the staff,” Yates said. “We created a Google form that will go live this week, so the faculty can fill out what they need. We have three sizes available: the large bones, the medium, and the small, so the staff can tell us what they want [through the Google form]. Once they order, we will deliver [the treats] to their mailboxes.”

In addition to selling to the school’s faculty, Yates hopes that over the next couple of weeks, the LZHS students will have the opportunity to purchase their own dog treats.

“We want to sell during lunch periods,” Yates said. “But, for right now, our plan is to start slow and work out the kinks before we move on to another group.”

If students are interested in purchasing a dog treat for your furry friend at home, make sure you keep an eye out during lunch periods for an opportunity to buy these homemade goods.