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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think a food bank is not an appropriate place for a school trip?

94 replies

mumofmanymonsters · 04/02/2015 18:33

I had to name change because I think it will be obvious who I am!

DD is in 5th year (Scotland, she is 16) and we have had a letter home saying that every class has to take their turn of going to watch how the local food bank works.

I really don't think it's right. Surely people deserve more privacy than a bunch of gawping teenagers?

She doesn't want to go and I'm not making her.

OP posts:
morningtoncrescent62 · 04/02/2015 19:35

we need to get to a position where there is no stigma attached to going to a food bank- then it wouldn't be an issue

No, we need to get to a position where as one of the richest countries in the world we are able to guarantee that everyone has enough to eat. As a country we're short of redistribution, not food. Or sympathy.

PiperIsTerrysChoclateOrange · 04/02/2015 19:37

I think it's a good idea, these young adults are 16. Very soon some may become parents. Some will be living on their own with in a few years.

PtolemysNeedle · 04/02/2015 19:38

At 16, I'd expect the students to be able to act respectfully towards the service users, so I dont see a problem with it.

I think it's a good thing actually, especially as the school is fundraising. Schools do too much fundraising for various things without allocating enough time to learning about the charities they're supporting or how they work or why they're needed. The students will probably learn loads.

Stinkle · 04/02/2015 19:38

I'm surprised they're allowing it to be honest.

We allow visits to the warehouse where they can do something helpful and constructive, never to the collection points.

At the collection points we provide a hot meal, there are trained volunteers who are experts on benefits who will talk to the clients. What are they going to do with them? What are they hoping achieve? 30 people just hanging around getting in the way. Is it a trio out to look at the poor people?

SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius · 04/02/2015 19:47

That seems like the most sensible approach, Stinkle.

scarlettsmummy2 · 04/02/2015 19:54

I think if it was a small number of pupils going, it would be ok, but a bus load of thirty pupils trailing in seems to be in very bad taste.

Bumbiscuits · 04/02/2015 20:07

Junior school pupils at my kids' school worked at the food bank for a day. They helped out by sorting out donations, working behind the scenes, IIRC.

They also had a drive before that to get donations from parents.

Not a bad thing, I think. The bad thing is that there's a need for these places in this day and age, but that's another debate.

ThatBloodyWoman · 04/02/2015 20:10

Take them to the City of London,and point out to them the wages being earned in some of those skyscrapers.
Then explain to them why people go to foodbanks.

SconeRhymesWithGone · 04/02/2015 20:11

As an American, I don't think that the normalization of food banks (as in the case in the US) is a good direction for a country like Scotland to be moving in. One thing that I respect about Scotland is that there is a stronger sense of the social contract there that means a greater acceptance that government policy should be the primary means to address economic disparity.

I understand that things have changed in Scotland and in the UK in recent years, but it is far better to address lack of means to buy food in ways that don't put people who can't afford to buy it from their own resources out there for all to see. Government and charities need to work on systems that give poor people the resources to buy what they need in Tesco like everyone else.

And in the meantime, no one who is not essential to the mission of distributing the food should be there.

TooHasty · 04/02/2015 20:18

I think you need to assume the foodbank will have thought this through and know how to do things senitively.Probably the kids will be kept away from the pick up point and service users asked if they would mind speaking to visiting school kids and then shepherded through to meet them.

SconeRhymesWithGone · 04/02/2015 20:22

Service users should not be asked if they would mind speaking to school kids. It creates a subtle quid pro quo. Here you are getting free food because you have no money; could you please come over here and chat with a teenager about what that feels like?

Ubik1 · 04/02/2015 20:27

We also have big collections at school for the food banks.

My concern would be that this visit might present food banks as a normal part of society.
Food banks are not normal. It's a bloody disgrace that they have to exist at all.

PtolemysNeedle · 04/02/2015 20:32

I can imagine teenagers getting a huge amount out of a visit to a food bank, and food banks are always asking for donations through schools.

I think it's very wrong to ask parents to donate through children, and I hold that against any charity, especially the big BBC ones, but at least this food bank is trying to give something back after using the school for donations. I know I'd be inclined to give more in donations knowing that my children were benefiting from the arrangement, usually I only give the minimum I have to through schools on principle, and because I prefer to give to charities I have chosen rather than the school.

HerRoyalNotness · 04/02/2015 20:40

There is a big difference between lecturing teenagers about what food banks do, what they're for and why they're needed and actually taking them and showing them that everyday people, their neighbours, the milkman, the lady who works in boots, whoever, are in need of food parcels in a so called first world country.

It will have much more impact on them, and can be followed up with discussions at home about why people are in this state, the low level of benefits, despite what the masses think, counting every penny and not being able to afford the essentials.

We talk to our DC a lot about people not being able to afford things we can, and us not affording what others can, and also about people being hungry and homeless etc.... but it's an abstract concept for them until they see it with their own eyes. I pray they never have to experience it.

OddFodd · 04/02/2015 20:49

If they're talking to them about the explosion of foodbanks in the last few years as a result of greedy bankers and a tory administration, then fine. If they're using it as an opportunity to 'other' the poor, then absolutely not.

I would trust some of the teachers I know to do this well and others not. On balance, I'd say you're right OP.

Original poster
mumofmanymonsters · 04/02/2015 20:51

There is a big difference between lecturing teenagers about what food banks do, what they're for and why they're needed and actually taking them and showing them that everyday people, their neighbours, the milkman, the lady who works in boots, whoever, are in need of food parcels in a so called first world country.

But people's personal circumstances are not the business of the whole local high school! There will be people who don't come if they know a class of kids are going to be there.

OP posts:
SolidGoldBrass · 04/02/2015 20:52

I would be concerned about normalising the existence of food banks, as well. I find the fact that nearly all the local supermarkets now have a Food Bank Collection Point instore worrying, too. The message seems to be that it's perfectly OK for large numbers of people to be dependent on the do-gooding whims of others.

revealall · 04/02/2015 21:01

Not do gooding whims...direct action.

PtolemysNeedle · 04/02/2015 21:05

I'm not sure I understand the argument about normalising food banks.

It is normal for there to be people in need. There have always been people who are poor and in need of help, and there probably always will be. The only thing that's changed is how help is given, and students will be better prepared to consider their own opinions on the best way for help to be given if they have seen some of it for themselves.

SconeRhymesWithGone · 04/02/2015 21:09

I think that help should be given through government policy. It's why I am a lefty Democrat and not a Republican. And why I think that normalizing food banks is not the right solution.

OddFodd · 04/02/2015 21:11

Ptolemys - no, the welfare state adequately provided until quite recently. It was hard but most people could afford to feed their families. It's frighteningly easy to fall through the net now. That shouldn't happen.

HerRoyalNotness · 04/02/2015 21:13

people's personal circumstances are not the business of the whole local high school!

When it comes to people being too poor to buy food, that is the business of society as a whole. How can we change it, what can we do? Young people might not understand that it isn't the homeless, the drug and alcohol abusers using the food banks, it's parents of their classmates, the guy that works in the corner store, the mother across the road whose husband has just walked out. It is every day people, and it can happen to anyone. They need to see that the government is not looking after their citizens, and learn what they can do about it.

fluffyraggies · 04/02/2015 21:14

So on the fence with this.

Is it 'normalising' or is it 'exposing the reality of something which should really not be happening in our society'.

It all depends very much upon how it is presented to these youngsters.

And don't forget some of them may very well come from families that are actually having to rely on food banks themselves.

WorraLiberty · 04/02/2015 21:16

I can't make up my mind if the trip (while the food bank is open) is a good idea or not.

But please credit the pupils with a little more intelligence and compassion, than to describe them as a 'bunch of gawping teenagers' for goodness sake.

SconeRhymesWithGone · 04/02/2015 21:30

I agree with not describing them as "gawping," but 30 is surely a bunch, which to me is part of the problem.