Members of the Rookie Cookie Crew Baking Co., Burlington Central Middle School students Jessi Blakley, Mia Wiltsie and Jasmine Zayed recently baked and sold 71 trays of cookies and treats with the proceeds going toward helping the needy.
The items for sale included raspberry almond shortbread cookies, Russian tea cakes, Christmas cutouts, peanut-butter bonbons, and dipped pretzel rods. Each tray offered a baker’s dozen of either the same variety or a mixture of the five available choices.
Cathy Britts-Axen, eighth-grade special education teacher at Central Middle School, is the trio’s teacher and the one who designed the course.
“This is the first time we included an economic unit into our mathematics/English language arts class,” she said. “Students need to experience equations in a real-world setting. They had to estimate, calculate, project and present the entire business plan to Central Middle School Principal Carie Walter.”
According to Britts-Axen, the students did the majority of the work.
“Teacher on special assignment Michael Doyle worked with the students on the technology to market their business,” Britts-Axen said. “Our paraprofessional, Barb Head, and I guided the students. We recruited last year’s math teacher, Jeannette Russell, to help with the baking in the school’s kitchen.”
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There were also volunteers such as Wiltsie’s mom, Jody.
Britts-Axen wanted the students to learn about the different aspects of running a business.
“We watched videos of students who have been successful in starting a business,” she said. “We studied supply and demand in the economy. Students looked at the life of Booker T. Washington and how he became one of the first economists in the United States.”
As the crew’s president, Blakley kept track of the orders. Everything was entered in a Google form on the new Chromebooks that Central Community Unit School District 301 students received this year.
“I had to include each customer’s name, telephone number, address, how many trays he or she ordered, and if there were any special orders,” Blakley said. “I took the orders and put them on a spreadsheet.”
As the crew’s treasurer, Wiltsie said she had to keep track of the money and figure out what baking supplies were needed.
“We shopped at Sam’s Club, Wal-Mart, Target and Woodmans,” Wiltsie said. “We picked out three different types of pretzel rods with different prices and tasted them. We found that the lowest-priced pretzels did not taste as good as the others. We also checked pretzel packages for broken pieces and figured out how this affected unit prices.”
Zayed was the crew’s product manager. She was also the one who suggested that they should make peanut-butter bonbons, which turned out to be the crew’s favorite item.
Wiltsie and Zayed wrote a script for an online video that helps to sell their products. They also created a logo with Doyle’s help. Their company motto was “Don’t Bake. Let us create.”
The crew had a total of three weeks for the project. Their original goal was to raise $500.
The trays were picked up by customers at the school during the week before winter break.
The crew earned a total of $313. After expenses were subtracted, they were able to donate $150 to Feed My Starving Children and the Northern Illinois Food Bank.
The students all said they learned a great deal from the project.
“They were not just baking cookies,” Britts-Axen said. “They were also doing linear equations. We need to look at learning as a lifelong experience and not just look at test scores. I believe students need to experience math and English skills not just in the classroom but in real-life scenarios.”
Britts-Axen and Doyle are hoping that the three students can travel to Springfield for TECH 2016 on May 10.
“We are working with the Kane County Regional Office of Education in order to try and get funding for this trip,” Doyle said.
Denise Moran is a freelance reporter for The Courier-News.