Community Corner

Sweet Way to Pay for College – Teens' Tabletop Bakery on Solano Ave.

Two middle-school students were getting an early start on paying for college on Saturday – selling their homemade baked goods on Solano Avenue at the Berkeley and Albany border.

It was almost like stumbling upon an oasis.

A hungry and not entirely elated Patch editor was walking down Solano Avenue Saturday afternoon – his shoulders slightly hunched against the chill and occasional drifts of drizzle under a gray, overcast sky – when his day was suddenly brightened by the cheerful smiles of two middle-school students and their sidewalk table filled with a colorful array of fresh, homemade cookies, cupcakes, brownies, pudding and a tempting, rich German chocolate cake.

"They're 100 percent homemade," said Isabel Hackett, one of the young entrepreneurs who'd set up their wares in front of the small Solano Peralta Park across the street from 7-Eleven at the border of Berkeley and Albany.

And why were Isabel and her partner Asha Byrd, both of Willard Middle School in Berkeley, doing this?

"We're planning on saving 25 percent for college," Isabel said.

On learning the purpose of their enterprise, the Patch editor was able to cheerfully exchange 75 cents for a chocolate-chip cookie and $2 for a slice of German chocolate cake – without a peep of protest from his calorie-counting conscience.


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