Items clink and wheels creak as students and their teacher push a cart loaded with coffee and juice through Dillingham Elementary Thursday morning. A student knocks on a classroom door, and when the teacher answers, they hold out a steaming cup of coffee and press a button that activates a recorded response, “Hi, I have your coffee.” With a smile from the teacher, change is exchanged, and the cart rolls on.
Managing the cart is a big deal for these students and their teacher Jaclyn Hyde, who leads the Structured Learning Classroom at Sherman Middle School, which serves students with more significant needs.
“These are critical life skills,” Hyde said. “Students can practice these skills in the classroom, but when they practice outside of the classroom with people they don’t know, they develop better social skills. I’m very proud of them.”
The project, named Bearcat Baristas, focuses on the real-world application of skills. Students may perform a routine, such as asking about coffee, smoothly in their classroom but have trouble doing the same routine in a different setting. When these Bearcat Baristas travel to a different campus, they practice routines in unfamiliar environments.
“In the beginning, it’s teacher-led and prompted, but we’ve slowly phased that out,” Hyde said. “Now my kids only need minimal reminders. They’re thriving in this, and I think they feel they’re building independence.”
Hyde first started Bearcat Baristas during the 2019-20 school year when Dillingham was an intermediate school, but the project was sidetracked by the pandemic. It relaunched this semester with a coffee cart tour first held at SMS.
“The staff at SMS is so lovely and supportive, and the administration is great,” Hyde said. “Everyone is patient with us. My kids can take their time, and the teachers just wait.”
Campus staff order ahead of time using an online form, and a student reads the order and calls it out, like a coffee with sugar but no cream. Hyde or her teacher aides make it, and a student hands it to the customer. Another student makes sure the change is counted. All proceeds go to replenishing the cart supplies for the Bearcat Baristas.
“After we sell coffee at Dillingham, I’ll replenish whatever is used up and buy fresh for the next week,” Hyde said. “The students also have to practice with real money. You can only practice with fake money for so long.”
Bearcat Baristas is based on a nationally-recognized curriculum called Linking Assessment and Instruction for Independence (LINKS) that serves older students and builds functional skills. It focuses on developing independence, and Bearcat Baristas incorporates that focus.
“Some of these ideas originally came from LINKS, but Jaclyn made it her own,” said Tamara Dutton, SISD behavior specialist who helps oversee student services for specialized classrooms. “She tracks the progress of students and makes adjustments to support them when needed.”
The idea also caught the attention of Nate Marsden, training specialist with STAR Autism Support, which created LINKS. He’s based in Utah and consults with school districts throughout the U.S. He observed the Bearcat Baristas in action at Dillingham.
“What’s unique about this is that they’re giving all the students opportunities to do multiple jobs,” Marsden said. “Educators focus a lot on skills and not always on preferences, and that’s just as important.”
Other campuses have been taking notice as well. Hyde said teachers at an elementary and the high school also showed interest in observing the Bearcat Baristas in action.
“They’d like to move it to their campus as something smaller,” Hyde said. “At the elementary school, they could have cold beverages and cookies, and as they get older, they could handle more.”
The Bearcat Baristas is just one project that Hyde is working on at SMS to engage students in creative ways, and she’s looking forward to the future.
