Children cooking school lunches

[BeDenimZebra]

My children have been complaining about finding hair in their school lunches for a couple of months now, I thought they were exaggerating as I know they prefer packed lunches as it allows more playtime but I like them to have a hot nutritious meal as often as possible.

A friends child was here playing today and mentioned the hair too and said it was because the nurture children won't wear hats when making the lunches.

On further exploration it turns out that some children who require extra support are helping to cook the lunches that we pay for every day and looking at the photos on the school website they do not appear to be wearing ppe like the adult kitchen staff do.

I am uncomfortable with young primary children preparing food that is in effect being sold commercially. I don't know how long this has been happening for but the write up on the website suggest it is a regular thing. I feel it is inappropriate that regular food hygiene practices seem to be ignored for the children helping in the pictures which seems to back up my childrens complaints about hair in food.

The school are notorious for being unwilling to discuss concerns of parents and I don't really want to get into a conflict with them if I am being over sensitive about this but when I'm spending £50 a week (between 3 children for lunch and morning snack) I feel they should be hygienically prepared. I know I could just relent and do packed lunches but I would rather they had a decent hot meal. Also I suspect that many other parents are also not aware of this scheme.

I’m normally very chilled out about what schools do but I wouldn’t be happy about that at all. I refused to eat anything my dc made at primary because I didn’t want to eat anything that’d actually been made by some child who’d had a sick bug etc etc.

Do you know if it’s an external company that provide the meals? Round here that seems to be a common model. If so I’d be contacting them.

Are the meals at school actually decent?

The school employ a cook directly and everything is prepared on site. The menu always sounds very nice and the children until recently have enjoyed them but I had put the change down to wanting more playtime!

I am a bit hyper vigilant about food hygiene so don't know if I am over reacting.

Sorry but what are "the nurture children" and why are they making the lunches?

I am too, op, and this wouldn’t be okay for me at all.

I think you definitely do need to raise this. Maybe from an “I can’t believe what my dc are saying, please clarify” stance which might make them think how inappropriate this is.

Yanbu, that’s disgusting. Surely the kids can’t be cooking food though? When are they doing it, missing lessons?

From what I can see on the website it is children who require some emotional or social support. Both my friends child and the school website refer to them as nurture children.

At most schools the kitchen is child free zone for health and safety reasons.

the “nurture” group is usually a group of children with moderate to severe SEN or disabilities who are in mainstream school but not able to cope with it full time so have their own separate group.

are you sure they are making the school lunches as opposed to baking biscuits or similar which are available at lunchtime?

Presumably they are missing lessons, I can't be certain of this though.

I would check this before going in complaining.
We have some sen children who would do activities like cooking but this would be with a TA and in another room, not the actual school kitchen! I don't think any school kitchen would want children getting in the way (or is yours a small school where they don't have much to sort?). We have 3 full time kitchen staff preparing meals.
The TA might access the kitchen once lunch has been served to put things in the oven, but again this isn't children going in and out of the school kitchen.
I would be cautious about what you are saying.

Also it's not just sen/nurture groups who might do cooking - my own children have made bread and pizzas at school - again the making happens in another room and TAs take the products to the school kitchen for cooking.

Nope I wouldn't be happy with this either OP.

That's disgusting. I'd not consider that a 'decent' meal at all, and I'd do packed lunches (which I hate doing, DD has school dinners)

I'd be worried about what else is getting in it / hygiene that doesn't have readily visible evidence like hair.

I'm assuming that you wouldn't continue eating food from a place that routinely had hair in it, so I don't know why you want your DC to.

Tbf my dc do a lot of cooking at school as part of their lessons and I never eat them 🤢

I’d also not be happy that “nurture children” are being used effectively as unpaid labour in school kitchens - I know they need a lot of support so will probably be more work for the staff which is an issue in itself, but kids shouldn’t be put to work in schools.

I will absolutely be doing packed lunches in the short term but I would prefer this to be sorted and hot lunches resumed.

The idea that children are in a school kitchen is ridiculous and not an appropriate intervention but it almost certainly causes more work for the kitchen staff, not less, so I don't think you can call it unpaid labour.

I'm a primary SENCO and wouldn't be happy either OP.

The school website is very clear that selected children help in the kitchen to prepare the schools lunches, this is not something they are hiding just something I was unaware of. I have no issue with cooking activities at school as part of the curriculum as I feel that sits very differently.

As a solution could you do hot food flasks for your kids, that’s what I used to do for DD because she didn’t like the lunches as school but wanted hot food. I’d make a bigger than necessary dinner, then the next morning just heat up the leftovers, put them in a food thermos and she’d have that hot at lunch time. Cheaper than school dinners, I knew she’d eat it and easy to sort in the morning. If you heat the thermos by pouring boiling water in it and letting it sit with the lid on for 5 minutes before filling with piping hot food then everything would still be nice and hot at lunchtime.

I wouldn't be happy about this at all and coming from someone with a SEND child, I'd be unhappy if they were using my child as part of free labour. It isn't appropriate for many, many reasons.

I did this for DS in y6 as the combination of yR sized portions and often running low on food on the last sitting meant that he was on the cusp of becoming underweight for the first time. He's not keen on sandwiches and needed something more substantial to fuel him.

I have just ordered food flasks as a stop gap but I think I will still talk to school about it as surely they are breaking health and saftey/food hygiene rules?

They’re preparing food that is paid for by parents, and they receive no payment for their work. The fact they need support to do it doesn’t change the nature of it. I’d hit the roof if my DD was being used to make lunch for other kids in the school.

As the parent of a child who would be considered a ‘nurture child’, fuck that. It’s not my kid’s job to fanny about in an industrial kitchen preparing food for the ‘normals’, it’s their job to be educated and it’s school’s job to be doing the educating.

I’m almost always on schools side tbh (teacher, know how hard working in a school is etc) but I think this is gross. Report it to environmental health?