To have some sympathy with the "Jamie Oliver Burgers through the fence" mothers?

[Fridayfeeling]

We got a letter home earlier this week asking not to put crisps, chocolate, sweets in our children's lunchboxes.

How about you Fu*k off and mind your own business - a mini roll never killed anyone (especially as part of a balanced diet) !

I am very much for a balanced diet and have no objection to the occasional crisps or chocolate but they do not need to be in a school lunch box!

How come chocolate cake in lunch boxes is bad yet a big stodgy pudding with a school dinner is OK?

Re the children whose parents send only crisps and cake in - how is a letter home banning them going to help? It's not very constructive.

I don't know any schools that do big, stodgy puddings anymore.

Ours does. Next week's menu - plum crumble & custard, chocolate chip cookie and milk, fudge tart and chocolate, blueberry muffin and milk and jam shortbread and custard.

"put up or get out" expat? What? Out of the school? Out of the country even? Noone should question anything and has to agree with everything the gov't say and do? That seems a bit extreme and undemocratic to me.

I think I feel the same as you, Fridayfeeling.

Juule, people have explained OVER and OVER again why some schools have put these rules in place.

Really, is it that big a deal to leave the sweeties, crisps and chocolate out of the lunchbox?

Because if it is, and your school actually has a policy like this, why not consider another place for school?

I mean, is it that much of a dealbreaker?

Tthe only time my children will eat healthily without being pressured into it is at school, when all the other children are eating healthily.

it's a real battle at home. I have to beg and negotiate to get them to eat fruit. At least I know they've eaten well at school.

the burger mums are idiots. McIdiots.

If the school isn't serving healthy lunches then it is a bit hypocritical to insist on healthy lunch boxes! However where they are, parents should back it up by fitting in. I don't see the hardship in a DC getting through the day without crisps or chocolate!

I wouldn't go private if you think you'll get an easier deal over it! DD is in private prep school and the rules regarding lunch and snacks is much more strict.

To start with school dinners are compulsary for all - no one can bring packed lunch, no one can go home for lunch. There is only one choice for main, unless vegetarian. And then dessert is the dessert offered or fruit. Served with water.

Mid morning snack is sent in my parents but cannot be sweets, crisps and chocoloate, nor nuts. They recommend fruit or veg. It is supposed to be a healthy snack sent it.

AbbeyA - some of the puddings DD's school serves include the traditional school-type puddings like sponge and custard. But they are served a whole balanced meal, all freshly cooked on site. So the pudding is part of that balanced meal, and there is fruit as an option also which a few children do actually take up.

Oh and all members of staff stay for school lunch too, and sit with the children.

Our school does offer puddings, but as Hula says it is in the context of what came before. We also have a first rate (and I do mean first rate) salad bar where you can have a great salad and a fresh fruit salad (in fruit jusce not syrup) for £1.80.

Many of the staff use the school cantee when they have time

But if pudding is acceptable as part of a balanced meal, why are mini-rolls (for example), not OK as part of a healthy packed lunch?

But if pudding is acceptable as part of a balanced meal, why are mini-rolls (for example), not OK as part of a healthy packed lunch?

In our school a mini roll would be fine, or a biscuit. It is chocolate and sweets that are not allowed. I agree that if pudding is served as part of school lunch then some equivalent should be allowed in packed lunch. I am guessing from the OP that cake or biscuits have not been banned at her school either, just chocolate, sweets and crisps.

I wouldn't imagine that cake is banned, I don't see anything wrong with a mini roll, but definitely not a chocolate bar or sweets.
I don't see anything wrong with fruit crumbles and custard.

Because it is near impossible to monitor the packed lunches of large numbers of children.

I would estimate that over half of our kids have some for of packed lunch, that is over 650 kids. You can't chech to see that a lunch is ballanced.

With the hot meals (or salad-sandwitch options) we know what the kids are getting

Pudding is acceptable as part of a balanced meal because the child will have sat through the balanced first course and the school has control over what the children have eaten over the course of a week. I do agree that it would be a bit odd to ban chocolate in lunch boxes and serve chocolate sponge as part of a school dinner.

However, surely people can see that the rules about pack lunches are put in place so that people don't send their children to school with 2 Mars bars and a red bull?

But there was an article in the paper the other day (Guardian or Observer, can't remember which) that the healthy school meals policy is not working.

Children in Secondary school are not buying it, so catering companies are losing profit, and are not undertaking or renewing contracts with schools. I teach in a secondary, and all the kids make for the local shops every day to buy chips etc. (This is in a wealthy area)

Mini rolls, crumble etc are not really that big a crime are they? I think it has gone too far, and so do most of my colleagues

How old are the children going out to buy chips?

Am I missing something or isn't there a clear difference her?

The schools are funded and regulated by the government and therefore their policies, to a large degree, should be set by the government - as indeed they are. So if the elected government believes that providing healthy meals should be mandatory then schools should indeed provide healthy meals.

On the other hand, individual's eating habits (the last time I checked) were not a matter of government policy and therefore it seems an utterly unjustified intrusion to attempt to regulate them via the monitoring of school lunches.

I'm aware that I sound dangerously close to the Jeremy Clarkson/ DM brigade here and I know that drawing lines in these public/ private matters is often tricky but in this case it seems pretty darn straightforward - schools are obliged to provide healthy meals but children are free to eat what they want.

I agree that as part of a good diet, a mini roll here and there as a treat, or an occassional packet of crisps isnt a bad thing and i do think that its all going a bit over the top. But i also think that the burger mothers are incredibly silly and are not setting a good example to their children and looking at the state of those particular mothers, there isnt much hope for the kids.
Very childish, not helpful and dont you need a license to sell food!

We don't allow our kids to go off site (the sixth formers can) unless they have a letter from their parents, and live close enough to 'go home' for lunch.

We know that some of these kids do go to the chippie/sweet shop, but the numbers are small.

The healthy food thing is working fairly well where I work, as the food options being offered to the kids are good (staff opt to eat them!) on a normal day the hot options will be things like roast pork 'dinner', veggie lasagne and chicken curry. there is the salad bar, and there are always bagettes, wraps, toasted bagels, and veggie pizza slices.

In addition the change over was done over slow time, so the kids had time to adjust.

And they still get the option of fish and chips on a Friday!

Individual's eating habits are not regulated outside school. In the same way that a school can make sure that a child wears school uniform and doesn't use a mobile in school they can have rules about packed lunches in school.

Can't understand why people want the child sitting next to thier's at the lunch table to be bringing in Mars Bars for lunch.

and I'm not wild about teaching kids who have lunched on Mars bars and red bull

And if people had seen some of the behaviour I have, they wouldn't want their kids being in the class with them either.