How much lunch money for secondary school child.

[Ch0colatecake]

DS starting secondary school in September, was wondering how much you give them for lunch per day/week?

£2.50 in DC school. That will get a hot meal and a drink. Less if they just want chips or toastie etc

There's a daily meal deal in my sons school for a similar amount. But I would imagine with Covid they will limit lunch options and lunchtime might be shorter so your son might want packed lunches to start with.

As little as possoble or they buy iced buns, donuts and sugary drinks. But more seriously, the main is £2.45 a day so i put two weeks worth on as its easy to top up. A lot of the kids spend about £3 a day.

Thank you, like the sound of meal deal.

mine gets £5 a day but that’s for breakfast when he gets to school, a snack at break, and lunch.

My ds gets a meal deal for about £3 a day...then he sometimes gets an extra drink or a cookie...generally between £15-20 a week. It adds up.. was a big shock as he had packed lunch at primary. I will say he loves the food in secondary school so I don't mind paying extra.

Kids get hungry at school. I gave my son at least £5 per day but topped up to £10 a day. He usually spent jn between those amounts.

@EnoughAlready2020 you spend £50 on your son's lunch each week!? That's half our family food budget! If it's that expensive for him to eat at school surely it's better to have packed lunches?

At our school £2.50 would buy a main meal and dessert but a lot of the kids don't like hanging round queuing and buy baguettes/snacks which works out much more expensive.

Something to consider when you're budgeting. Have you seen a sample menu?

I give my son packed lunch otherwise he would blast through any amount I give him. He started buying all sorts of danish pastries, donuts etc, so beware!

My son takes £3 per day, sometimes he comes home with change. This doesn't include his drink as he takes that separately.

I give 20 at the beginning of the month and when its gone its gone. There are always the ingredients for sandwiches available so I want to encourage them to think about how they use that £20, and make their own lunches too.

Meal deal is £2.40, and spends are limited to £4/day including breakfast club (toast, fruit+ bun = £1).

Nothing! He only gets 30 minutes for lunch so he takes a packed lunch, he's got a few quid on his dinner money account to get a cookie or a quick treat at break time every now and again but with only half hour he doesn't have time.

It completely depends on the school. If they're purchasing food from the school canteen itself then maybe get a list of their pricing. I went to two comprehensive schools pretty local to one another but the prices were wildly different.

Dd always had free meals but it was around £2.50 a day, enough for the meal deal.

My son spends £15 a week on lunch then an extra snack/drink each day

From chatting to friends it seems to be £2.50-£3.00 a day.

Worth having a conversation at the start of term around budget and trying to make sensible food choices. At the start of Y7 they seem to spend a bit more as it's all very exciting and feels 'grown up' but it settled down after a couple,of weeks. We made sure there was a little bit extra to start with just in case with the proviso that it was an emergency fund!

There was always plenty of food at home to make a packed lunch too.

15 pound a week. He doesn't always spend quite all of it some weeks, others he does if he has got up late and has breakfast at school.

That's just on food, he doesn't buy drinks at school.

I manage a secondary school kitchen.
Break is between 50p (cheese on toast) to £1.80 (panini) lots of our products are around 80p.

A full lunch (protein, carb, veg) is £2.50 desserts are optional at 80p drinks are 50p for water/flavoured water or £1.10 for milkshakes

Prepared fruit pots are 80p whole fruit is 40p

We also have breakfast with prices ranging from 40p to £1.00

The average spend is around £4 a day.

I have just been given an update by the head about return to school. My school are having groups of kids in on alternate weeks, no break time and an extended staggered lunch. I am thinking about splitting our staff team in half working in 2 separate teams on either alternate weeks or days (we have 10 staff and don’t need them all in the limited space) and am working on a simplified menu for the time being. So that means no plates/cutlery and food that is easily portable that can be pre boxes or wrapped so the kids can disperse around the school site.

@theproblemwitheyes sorry it wasn't a stealth boast - just my son used to go to after school clubs and I was worried he'd go hungry so he'd buy some snacks for that too. Ate quite a bit!

I put 40 quid on at the start of the year. There is still 39 on it now!
Dd decided to take a packed lunch once she realised the scrum for the dinner hall and her best friend has allergies so they all take allergy friendly packed lunches in her group and share! Might be a girl thing.

I put £10 a week on my daughters thumb and I provide plenty of stuff for packed lunches at home. I expect her to manage the money and if she runs out she has to make her own packed lunch. She's about to start Y8

But at dds school you can set a limit per day/week and find out what they have spent it on.