Scrolling through Instagram, interested students can see numerous club posts promoting a wide range of activities, but one page is particularly hard to pass by. It belongs to the Bake It Till You Make It club and features hand-drawn graphics of mouth-watering cookies and images of homemade cake pops and brownies.
The club is one of the more recent, innovative clubs that began the summer of 2024. Sofia Faraone and Tina Mohr, the junior co-presidents, said they both have a passion for baking and decided to start the club as a way of celebrating and expanding their hobby.
“We did a summer baking camp where we taught little kids how to bake, and it was a really good experience,” Faraone said. “We thought, why not do it at our school and make it a student organization?”
The club holds meetings every two weeks in art teacher Joel Tarbox’s room. Other leaders include vice president Mindi Hendley, treasurer Christina Labban and secretary Grace Lin, all juniors.
Each meeting, the officer team presents a slideshow teaching baking techniques and principles, such as how to make chocolate chip cookies, how to avoid common baking mistakes and exploring the variety of baked goods you can make.
They hold an interactive Kahoot! at the end of each meeting to quiz the members on what they learned in the baking lesson. After that, anyone who officially signs up for the club will receive a free homemade treat, personally baked by Mohr or Faraone.
“Every time we have a club meeting, we bring new treats [for everyone],” Mohr said. “We have a lot of kids that come to our club — up to 50 sometimes. It’s packed. We have boys and girls; a lot of juniors, sophomores and freshmen.”.
Part of their success engaging with various parts of the student body comes from the very nature of their club, which is based on a fun hobby that many people enjoy on their own.
“It’s not an academic club, which means it’s not boring, like just talking about STEM topics. No hate to STEM clubs. But also, baking is a lifelong skill and is a really fun thing to do,” Faraone said.
One of the club’s primary activities is holding bake sale fundraisers. While they held lessons in the first semester to prepare members for baking knowledge, they are transitioning to more fundraisers in the second semester. On Jan. 27, they held a bake sale with homemade snickerdoodle cookies, chocolate chip cookies, peppermint bark cookies, hazelnut cupcakes and strawberry cupcakes.
Baked goods for the fundraiser advertised on their Instagram page.
Though club members don’t bake during biweekly club meetings, they do bake together before fundraisers. For example, club members gathered at Faraone’s house on the Sunday before the Monday fundraiser, making batches of either cookies, brownies or cupcakes that they sell the next day.
“Our fundraisers get our students whom we teach in the bake club to implement their knowledge, like helping us bake all the cupcakes,” Faraone said. “They learn how to work in that business sense, like packaging everything out and like preparing for an actual sale.”
Next year, club members hope to continue their mission of bringing people together through their love of baking with more fundraisers. According to Mohr, if there are any extra baked goods in future events, they may donate it to senior centers or shelters. To expand throughout the larger community, they might develop into a nonprofit organization and become their own brand.
“It started as just hanging out and we were like, oh my gosh, this camp is fun. And also, we just love baking, and since our friends also like to bake, it was a great opportunity [to create this club],” Mohr said.