Transition students run bake sale, sell treats in cafeteria
A class’ bake sale sold out on Wednesday after students and staff bought treats in a short amount of time.
Transitions students in room B123 baked Rice Krispie treats and cookies Wednesday morning. These treats were sold in the school cafeteria during the 10:45-11a.m. summer school break. The cookies and Rice Krispie treats, “cost only 50 cents,” Andrew Koppel, 18-year-old Transition student, said. The sale was successful, as the Transitions students sold out of treats before the break was over.
“It went well. It was a success. We made $12, we sold out right away, so next week we’re looking to make some more,” Meagan Pagano, Transitions summer school teacher, said.
The Transitions class is a special education class for students after they graduate. It is a continuation of learning and practicing skills that they have learned in the past. These students also work in the greenhouse during the year.
Pagano says that the bake sale helps students to work on their math skills “so it is fun, but also academic as well for them.”
The bake sale is not only fun and academic for the students. The money made from the bake sale goes towards a bowling field trip the Transitions class is taking at the end of summer school. The money will also go towards equipment and tools the students use during the school year.
The bake sale runs on Wednesdays during the 10:45-11 a.m. break during the first and second session of summer school. Pagano said that the bake sale began four or five years ago. It was started by AnnaMarie Bader, Transitions teacher during the school year. The idea of the bake sale was to help Transitions students improve their baking skills.
“[Bader] suggested that when she taught these students during the summer, that this is something they could work on. [Baking is] just a skill that a lot of young adults need to work on. And with the bake sale, too, it helps them interact with with different students and people, and then also get that practice of cooking as well,” Pagano said.
The Transition students began preparing for the bake sale during the first week of summer school. Along with putting signs up around the school, the students took a field trip to Jewel Osco to get the ingredients needed for the treats they planned to make and sell. They made a grocery list and decided on what goods they wanted to sell at this year’s bake sale.
“The chocolate chip was most popular last year, so we decided to go with that again and they shopped for the Rice Krispie cereal, the butter, and the marshmallows last week,” Pagano said.
The morning of the bake sale, the students prepared all the treats for selling. The students divided into groups, half in charge of cookies and half in charge of Rice Krispie treats. Twelve cookies and 24 Rice Krispie treats later, the students were ready to sell their treats.
Sean Hussey, a 19-year-old Transitions student, helped make the Rice Krispie treats. He was very happy that people came to buy treats from him, but says that the Transition students “should make treats not just for the customers, but for [them]selves as well.”
Koppel was also happy to have people come to the bake sale.
“I was asking them saying, ‘I’m having a bake sale’,” Koppel said. “It’s only fifty cents for cookies or Rice Krispies.”
Pagano says she and her students hope that the bake sale can be as successful, or more successful in the Wednesdays to come.