To report to school what my DD told me about this lunchtime supervisor?

[Namechangingforthis2019]

Dd(8) told me that yesterday she saw a lunchtime supervisor take a fish finger off the tray at the serving hatch with her fingers and eat it. Dd said no other adults saw, she has seen this staff member do this before.
Would you email school and pass on what dd said?

A few bits of context -

• I believe dd, she is not likely to have made this up
• lunchtime supervisor has been working there about 30 years. She’s very harsh with the kids (based on what dd has told me) and anecdotally other parents have said even the staff are a bit scared of her!
• school has an outbreak of norovirus last week so have been very hot on infection control, washing hands etc.

I know she probably didn’t touch anyone else’s food, but it’s not right is it? If nothing else it’s unprofessional and sets a bad example to the kids. But I don’t want to bother the school if it’s not really a big deal.

Would you report it or leave it?

Yabu = I should not report it
yanbu = I should email the school about it

I’m going against the grain here, I think it’s inappropriate and poor modelling to the children. I would be very unimpressed to see any member of staff do that.

i would also worry that my child found this an issue.

@pastapestoparmesan

Why ?

(And before you ask - no she didn’t tell me I was being ridiculous not to my face and encouraged me to email the school!)

OP I'm really sorry to say this but I reckon she was taking the piss!

Clearly a wind up but thanks for making me laugh!

This is my new favourite thread 🐟 🍟

Embarrassed for you. You came so close to humiliating yourself - and only a mumsnet poll saved you. Please confirm you honestly shared the results of the poll with your daughter so she understands what a pill you were encouraging her to be.

I do think you are getting an unnecessarily hard time OP.

I wouldn’t ‘report‘ this, but if I saw staff in a canteen picking up food with their fingers, eating it and carrying on without washing their hands, all in full view of the customers, id probably eat elsewhere or buy a pre—packed sarnie.

It would suggest to me that perhaps some people needed to renew their hygiene certificates.

And before anyone says anything, yes I have worked in catering, and I was on the bones of my arse financially at the time. I absolutely ate ‘spare‘ food. (As did many of us) but you do it out of sight of customers and you wash your hands after. In fact the chef often took pity and often accidentally cooked too much of certain finger foods that can be grabbed and scoffed in between tasks.

@BaronessBomburst no doubt it’s unwise to engage in further discussion about this, but if I HAD proceeded with my (now I see ridiculous) plan to email the school I would have just passed on what dd mentioned. I wouldn’t have expected them to do anything particular other than ‘have a word’ if they saw fit.

I thought it was inappropriate and a bad example because presumably the kids would be told off if they took a fish finger off the tray with their fingers and ate it without a plate.

But I see now that my overall view of the situation was probably skewed by her reputation as being very harsh with the kids and the feeling that as she has been there so long no one addresses it with her because they are all a bit afraid of her!

You do realise that in the preparation of food it often had to be touched. All school kitchen staff are very highly trained in food safety and should be extremely vigilant re hand washing etc . As long as she washed her hands after eating it I don't think you can begrudge her a fish finger!

I’m going against the grain here, I think it’s inappropriate and poor modelling to the children. I would be very unimpressed to see any member of staff do that

Can you explain why, at least? I'm at a loss, surely kids aren't going to think any less of a teacher or supervisor if they see them eat a fishfinger? Lose respect or something?
They're humans, not robots and surely kids won't be traumatised or whatever from seeing Miss eat the odd fishfinger!

So what, do you object to a staff member having a free fish finger? What difference will it make.

As an example of how these things can grow legs - one of the lunchtime supervisors at the school I work in was reported by a child, then their parent for taking a drink out of a child's water bottle when they were on duty on our field.

The child insisted it happened several times and the parent would not let it drop until the school had done a 'full investigation'. It transpired that the supervisor had the same water bottle as this child (obviously) but the supervisor was so mortified by the whole thing - children calling her a 'thief' etc that she left the school. An extreme reaction, maybe, but she was genuinely upset by the whole thing.

As far as cooking exact amounts , any well run school kitchen will have cooked some extra to allow for the inevitable children that always seems to manage to spill their milk on their food

And I just realised I missed the norovius bit when I read the op. So she was eating and not washing hands (in full view) din the aftermath of a really contagious and unpleasant infection. Bleaugh.

The kitchen staff definitely Need to refresh the food hygiene training.

@Blackswan do you honestly think I should show this to my sweet sensitive 8yo dd? Have you seen some of the remarks and her and me?
She hasn’t given it another thought and as I said before wasn’t telling me so I would report it!

@RosesAndRaindrops

I will have to be careful, I was finishing a coffee when my class returned from playtime yesterday 😒

Oh Dear God, I can't believe you actually mentioned this to someone in real life land
You really have to get more OP

Bypass the school just call the police!!! How can we allow this to happen in front of our children! Your daughter was very right to report this back to you. What will happen next? Maybe the headteacher will have a cup of tea in their office!

Or get a grip and don’t fuel your daughter running to you with little tales like this it won’t make you or her very popular.

Call 101 and log it.

*out more

This means they cook only EXACT quantities

No they don’t.

*about her and me I meant!

Anyhoo I have tried to take this on the chin and with good grace but need to be off now as parenting calls!

@RevealTheLegend what's more likely, hundreds of primary school children coughing, licking their hands, sneezing, using the toilet all without washing hands and spreading the noro or a woman with 30 years experience in her job spreading the same virus by eating a fish finger with her hands? Don't be ridiculous

Children in schools know that just because they see an adult doing something it doesn’t mean they can do it. They don’t walk into assembly and sit on a chair. They don’t do the special clap and tell everyone to come and sit on the carpet. Anyway, they have to hold their tray with two hands so they couldn’t steal a fish finger in a copycat crime even if they were led into a life of crime.