Great letters in todays Guardian. makes perfect sense to roll out free school meals for all.
As you may have guessed, I am in love with my new video camera. It is perfect for school and the ideal blogging tool. Thanks Karl!
Thanks to Karen for todays report. Apologies for the shaky camera work!
Headteacher Tim Baker is doing a great job at Charlton Manor Primary School in Greenwich. He has employed a school gardener who is a valuable member of his staff. What a wonderful way to teach about food and diet.
Wonder how many other schools employ a gardener? Looks like the way forward to me!
Ms Wilkinson joined the children today in the Hall for lunch. However it was not particularly relaxing for her as increasing school dinner uptake means the tables get very squashed. Added to that staff shortages meant that Ms Wilkinson was greatly in demand. However it is brilliant to see busy staff taking time out to sit and eat alongside the children.
I had planned to show some pics of the food but I got in to the hall too late! Glad to see its being eaten Jeanette Orrey suggests that we should weigh the food waste so we can identify how much is being thrown away.
Will try again to get some photos of the food tomorrow
Well done Emma and the whole food for life partnership for a truly inspiring event. I can hardly believe how far we have come in such a short space of time. The schools that were featured were real trail blazers and showed how it is possible to get local communities connected to their food, re discovering skills such as cooking and growing and bringing in elders.
I am itching to go and have a look for myself to find out first hand how some of those schools managed it.
Prince Charles looked suitably impressed and made a lot of sense when he sugessted we used the lessons learnt in school catering to apply to hospital food.
Here are the authors of this great book, Kevin Morgan and Roberta Sonnino with Tim Lang and Roger Hinds from DEFRA. The book launch was absolutely brilliant. Shelia Sissulu gave us a global picture and spoke with passion about the challenges of organising school food in developing countries. The image of the small girls in Yemen, coming to school, veiled, accompanied by their fathers and taking home a small bag of carry out food for their families is one that will stay with me for a long time.
Tim Lang was great and did a good job as chair of tying all the themes together.
Another highlight of the evening was listening to the researchers from Hull who did such a magnificent job of establishing a free school meal pilot scheme . The early results looked so promising and it seems scandalous to me that councillors pulled the plug on it for such short term reasons.
The authors have done a great job of putting school food into a global context and they deserve to sell lots and lots of copies.
Well done to parents and staff of Kirkliston Primary School who sucessfully campaigned to force Edinburgh City Council to re open their school kitchen. The resourceful parents did a brilliant job of collecting 1000 sigs for a petition and they persuaded children to committ to school dinners thus making the service viable.The school cook is absolutely right when she says that freshly cooked meals taste better than pre prepared transported meals.
The media love to tell us parents what a rubbish job we are doing - lets hope we will now be reading stories congratulating the parents at Kirkliston for saving school meals!
Well done to the council for listening to the staff and parents and then acting upon it.
I had a really interesting meeting today with Tim Loughton MP conservative shadow minister for children. I did remember to draw breath to give him a chance to get a word in edgeways but it is so great having the opportunity to get school meals high up on all political agendas!
If you are interested in the school food debate then why not come along to the book launch of the School Food Revolution next wednesday to meet the authors Kevin Morgan and Roberta Sonnino
7.00pm Wed 26 November
Wollwich Town Hall
Wellington St
London SE18 6PW
Key note speaker: Shelia Sisulu, ( Dep Director of World Food Prog)
Chaired by Tim Lang
To reserve your place email Andrew.miller@earthscan.co.uk
Children at my school have taken the lead in asking teachers to come into the dining room and eat with them at lunch time. The kids are really keen to see staff in the dining room at lunch time. You can see them in this picture making a poster for the staff room. The good news is that staff have responded positively and have signed up to take a turn.
Wimbledon Park Primary have had real problems with the state of their kitchen and school dinners recently. Thanks to the persistence of their school bursar and the Head who were not willing to tolerate poor standards the local authority and ISS Caterhouse have taken decisive action. The kitchen will be shut while a deep clean takes place, (school dinners will brought in) and the staffing issues will be addressed.
Although it is disappointing that this has not been picked up earlier I am greatly reassured by the decisive action of both authority and caterers. They have not shirked their responsibilities and acted promptly.
I plan to pop in next week at some point and try a dinner for my self so watch this space
Thanks must go to the school bursar and headteacher who have pursued this. I have no personal connections with Wimbledon Park but I have always been so impressed with the love and respect they show all the children in their care. This extends to caring about the state of their toilets, playground resources and the lunchtime arrangements. Thank you.
Well I am now officially on the board of the School Food Trust! Scary photo to follow...
Steve Sinnott was the president of the National Union of Teachers who died suddenly this year. There is a prize in his memory for a young global campaigner of the year.
I was keen to apply in order to take some young people to the developing world to give them another perspective on school dinners. Sadly we don't really meet the criteria but I would encourage anyone who is involved with global education to apply. You will need to get your skates on though as the deadline is 14 November.
I wonder who I can persuade to fund a trip to India for some Merton school students to research the mid day meal scheme . I bet the scheme has plenty to teach us.
Ed Balls giving the keynote address at yesterdays conference. He was in listening mode and told me he would investigate ways of making free school meals easier to take up and will look at why it has to be applied for annually. Slightly less forthcoming about what to do about kids who are officially under the poverty line but still don't qualify for school meals.
Prof Winkler gave a great talk about the puchases children make at the school fringe. It was clear from his talk that whole school really means engaging with the local community.
The other really exciting presentation was from Rosemary Molinari from the Leeds School Meals Stategy group. They have commissioned research from the Faculty of Health at Leeds Metropolitan University to investigate why take up of free school meals in Leeds is so low. The initial finding indicate that the reasons the students gave were not due to stigma as is often thought but were for precisely the same reasons that children who eat packed lunches give for not choosing school dinners. Issues of choice, unpleasant dining rooms and queuing figured highly. Unfortunately I cant find the research on the web but will post a link to it as soon as I find one. I was really impressed with Rosemary. She had a really clear strategic vision. This is the first time I have heard about the exciting work Leeds are doing. am keen to find out more!!!
A great conference - thought provoking with terrific speakers.
Primary schools in Anglesea have complained to the Local Authority because their private catering company had promised to supply British or Irish meat in fact provided meat from Europe. You can read the full story here
This story cheers me up greatly. Pre-Jamie, I doubt many schools would have known or cared where there meat came from. The fact that 11 schools took it upon themselves to monitor the food they recieve and then make a complaint because it was wrong gives me hope that schools are taking more and more responsibility for the school dinner.
When schools are fully engaged it really raises standards. I believe that part of the reason caterers were able to get away with such poor quality dinners in the past was because of the lack of monitoring and holding to account. (I had planned to put a photo here to illustrate but Blogger won't let me!)
A big thank you to Stephanie from School Food Matters for sending me this link to Ann Cooper - the renegade lunch lady. She is a remarkable women who is passionate about what kids eat. I recomend you watch her video presentation - a bit shouty but fantastic!
Prue Leith and Jeanette Orrey make a formidable team!
Yesterday I attended a board meeting as an observer. I am so looking forward to 1 st November when I actually join .
Just in case anyone is wondering - yes the cake is compliant with nutrient standards. Tasted very good as well!
East Sheen Primary school were brought to Laleham Farm in Staines by their school caterers, Pride, to see for themselves where their school dinner vegetables come from.
They even got to eat them - how great is that? School Food Matters are doing a terrific job of linking up schools in their area with farms willing to work from farm gate to school plate.
Surely that's better than getting the children to colour in a few worksheets about food groups?!
Well done teachers, caterers and School Food Matters for showing us how it should be done!
You may have seen the media reports about the appalling food still being dished up in nurseries. Have a look at the full report produced by the Soil Association. Eagle eyed readers will spot parent Julia Staham from Newcastle. Julia was at a parents meeting in Newcastle that I spoke at. Julia came down to Merton and spent a day visiting Merton schools, meeting caterers and members of Merton Parents to help her set up her own Newcastle parents group. Looks like Julia has done a fantastic job in highlighting the dreadful provision in her own childs nursery. Well done Julia! let's hope that this exposure will herald some much needed reforms.
Very tasty dinner again. Cauliflower proved least popular with the kids on my table.However everyone I asked to try it did so. In fact some were so busy chatting to me they ended up eating it all once they started despite their original claims of loathing it
I gave a talk yesterday to a wonderful group of seasoned campaigners. They were warm,friendly and highly motivated. It was an absolute pleasure to go out for dinner with them afterwards and I felt very inspired by the stories they told. The chairperson was Maggie Alexander who, it turned out actually knew and worked with Shelia Mckechnie. She was very kind about the work of Merton Parents and felt that Shelia herself would have heartily approved of the award we won from her memorial foundation
Nice to see the School Food Trust getting such positive coverage in todays Sun.
I am generally very nervous of celebrity promotions and marketing aimed directly at children but this could be the exception that proves the rule.
Rhoda Grant MSP has written an article for the John O Groat journal arguing it is too difficult to feed decent food to all the primary school children in Scotland in a dining room fit for purpose. She goes on to make the startling claim that ,
" children who need a free school meal get one at the moment"
Does Rhoda really believe this? Does she honestly not know that at the moment it is perfectly possible to be officially in poverty yet not qualify for school dinners?
I suggest she takes a good look at the excellent work the Child Poverty Action Group have done on this very subject. It is shameful that those families who are under the governments own official poverty line are not entitled to claim free school meals.
Today I was interviewed by Helen for the National Council for Voluntary Organisation, (NCVO for short) They wanted me to tell the story of "Merton Parents" and explain how the involvement of parents was crucial to getting the kitchens built and the new contract in place.
It is amazing what Merton Parents was able to achieve- and to think in the early days all we were looking for was a few pieces of fruit and a tomato here and there!
Having met with my school governors tonight I am feeling more and more convinced that it should be good practise for every school governor visit to be combined with a school lunch with report back to full governing body. I would actually like to talk to all the governors in Merton to explain why promoting school meal uptake is vital in protecting the interests of our most vulnerable kids.
My top reasons for increasing uptake:
I remembered to take my camera to school today so I could get some informal pics of the food. What do you think?
Click here to see the rest of my photos.
The children's food campaign has come up with a great idea - "a parent power" network. This group will reach out to all those Mums and Dads who are sick of having junk food advertised to their kids. Just think of all those PTA members, WI ladies, Brown Owls and green campaigners we can attract. We need to protect our children from the insidious advertising that suggests to children that they will be more popular, have more friends, run faster etc if only they persuade their parent to buy them some branded food stuff.
We don't have to put up with it! Some lively local campaigns from the parent power network with give the food industry some food for thought!
Am packing my bag for school tomorrow. Will be sure to take my camera so I can post some pics of the school dinners.
I have had an interesting day in the offices of the School Food Trust with all the new board members. Came out with lots of homework -mainly reading.
Nice lunch!
First board meeting will be in 2 weeks time.
I had a great time this morning at the School of Social Entrepeneurs in Bethnal Green. I spoke to some students about campaigning techniques we used when we were fighting to improve school food in Merton.
The School is a fantastic resource which aims to equip its students with the skills they need to achieve their goals. It was set up by Michael Young who was a truly inspirational man.
Feeling all inspired I headed back to Morden to deliver a talk to PSHE teachers about the importance of protecting school dinners to help their school meet their "Every Child Matters" targets. Disaster struck when my presentation failed to load. I ended up speaking from memory without my powerpoint with the lovely pictures of firemen and soldiers from the Boer war. You can see the presentation I would have given if you visit my page on e-snips.
Well yesterdays school dinner at Poplar was very tasty. The reception children are currently enjoying a whole week of free school dinners as part of an experiment to increase uptake. Will be interested to see how many of the children go on to have them next week.
The majority of the children seemed to enjoy the food but I had forgotten what slow eaters very young children are. Some were very distracted by the noise of the older kids and the crashes and bangs from the kitchen. A couple of year 2 kids were concerned that I was only eating my dinner in the hall because I was no longer allowed in the staff room! Wonder what they thought I had done to get banned?!
Must remember to take my camera to school next week then I can post a pic of the dinner on my blog!
Update 14th October:
50% of reception children are now eating a school meal each day!
Great news that scotland is rolling out free school meals for younger children Universial free provision is simply the most cost effective and efficient way of getting our children to eat better.
When we set up Merton Parents for Better Food in School we knew we had so set out some clear objectives. These are the ones we came up with:
1) To ensure that Merton Council develops a robust process to manage change in the provision of Secondary School meals, such that each school puts in place a plan by which they will achieve the overall aim.
2) Only good quality ingredients are used in school meals.
3) All cooking and food preparation is done on site.
4) Eating lunch is a pleasant experience for students.
5) The school lunch becomes an integral part of the education offered by the school.
6) The Council sets up an effective system for monitoring school dinners to ensure that the standards above are met and continue to be met.
7) To agree a target date by which all of the above will be achieved with clear, specific and measurable milestones.
You can find the more detailed version of these objectives on the Merton Parents For Better Food in School website - here.
