Students bake happy cookies and bring smiles to children's ward

Professional Cookery students at Bay of Plenty Polytechnic brought smiles all round for children at Tauranga Hospital’s children’s ward when they dished out handmade cookies last week.

The cookie idea was the brain child of student Ramon Hopkins, who brought together a team of his fellow classmates for a day to mix, bake and personally deliver the cookies. Coralee Merrie, who works as an orthopaedics nurse at Tauranga Hospital, also joined the team to spend a morning in the kitchens.

Ramon put his cookery skills to good use in the hope of spreading a little bit of happiness “I just wanted to put a smile on a kid’s face,” says Ramon. “Sometimes the simple things in life are those that give us happiness and a simple smile can create more smiles.”

The group was supported by the Polytechnic, who offered the use of their training kitchens at the Windermere campus, and the Bake Shack in Papamoa, who generously donated flour, eggs and sugar for 200 cookies.

Ramon and Coralee spent an afternoon at Tauranga Hospital visiting the children’s ward and decorating happy faces onto the cookies with sweets and icing with the children, enabling each child to design their own unique cookie. The activity also provided a welcome distraction to the children and their families. Coralee made sure they spent time on her own ward too, giving out cookies to patients in orthopaedics.

In total around 200 cookies were given out with some being delivered already decorated for the youth worker volunteers at the Hillier Centre, a community centre in Mount Maunganui offering counselling and support to children, young people and families.