To think secondary schools shouldn’t have compulsory school dinners

[HitMissBowl]

DS is going to be starting a new secondary school in September. He will be one of the first set of pupils in year 7.

The school have stated that they will have compulsory family lunches, so nobody will be allowed to bring in packed lunch or any other type of food into school. Sounds good? Except in a few years time I’ll have 3 children in the school and will be spending well over £7K a year on school lunches for them.

How is this even fair? Dh and I will be earning over the £16k limit for free school lunches so how will we afford it? Apart from this, and the school uniform, the school sounds like it will be exceptional and academic and suit DS.

Is it legal for schools to make school dinners compulsory?

Finland has the best education system in the world.

This is what they do in Finland.

However it sounds like they are cherry picking random bits of the Finnish system without looking at practicalities.

However surely they have vegans and coeliacs and allergies in Finland- how do they work it?

I’m anaphylactic to Quorn and I work in a school - how would it work for me..?

save with all the rubbish from biscuits and crisps and water bottles that are thrown away each lunchtime

great idea

@leavethelambsalone

Your post is very silly because you've totally ignored the OP. Not everyone can afford it and not everyone sends in plastic in a packed lunch. By all means ban junk food and single use plastic (I don't know anyone who buys a plastic bottle for packed lunch rather than a re-usable one anyway) but don't force people to pay for lunches they can't afford - imagine doing that at an adult work place? There'd be outrage.

This is what they do in Finland.

Except in Finland they don't charge the parents.

I'm pretty sure I know which school this is. If so my child will also be attending.
What I've taken from it is that they said that to serve good quality meals they felt that vegetarian meals were a better option for cost and environmental reasons. I suppose that covers religious reasons too.
They are doing a free breakfast club every morning with free porridge and then other healthy breakfasts.
There are only snacks that are available are healthy ones on site as they said that it's makes it easier to manage.
Also the lunch is a family meal where there is one dish that everyone eats and they sit together.
Cost aside it all seems fairly reasonable.
If it IS the school I think it is then I'm assuming it wasn't your first choice. It wasn't mine either but I'm just happy to not be sending my child on a 15 mile bus journey everyday.

Boom yes Finland don't charge, and it is the cost that is OP's gripe. But many posters on here have said their child would not be able to eat the food, but Finland don't seem to have that problem, and they only offer one choice.

I see what you mean ineed.

I don't know what the situation is for SEN kids in Finish schools, but I suspect that the relatively homogenous culture makes issues less pronounced than in British schools. Ans that they may also be able to adapt the menu when, in the teachers' opinion, it is appropriate since they give teachers much more autonomy and authority.

Of course you can do packed lunches for less than that. I completely agree with the PPs that have said it's to keep the riffraff out.

I never had hot meals at school, always packed lunch. Loads of kids at my secondary school were the same. Have times really changed that much?

£1482 to feed three children a decent lunch throughout the year seems pretty reasonable to me

I think it should very reasonable too. A decent healthy packed lunch wouldn't be much less. Three children was always going to mean a larger food bill.

I think it's a great idea to ensure all children have a good healthy lunch as secondary lunch boxes can be very hit and miss from seeing my children's friends.

@BottleOfJameson
I teach a year 1 class and there are at least 7 children in my class who bring in a brand new plastic bottle of water every single day! It infuriates me. Even more so when they drink 5% of the bottle and then I have to pour it all away at the end of the week and put all of the bottles in the recycling

My decent packed lunches are a lot less.

And a whole lot healthier than the paninis, pizza slices and sausage rolls they spend their money on instead of the cooked lunch nobody wants.