SCHOOL FOOD TRUST
Food for thought
What is the School Food Trust and what does it do? We
ask chief executive Judy Hargadon to explain
conditions for staff and children were improved. The government pledged £280 million to overhaul the provision of food in schools and the School Food Trust was set up to drive the work that would be needed. The Trust was charged with promoting the education
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and health of children and young people by improving the quality of food supplied and consumed in schools. Since then, the importance of that remit has become even more apparent. An ever-growing body of evidence links children’s diets to their immediate and long-term health, while research in primary schools suggests that when children eat a healthy lunch in a pleasant environment, they are more alert and more likely to be “on task” in teacher-led sessions afterwards. The Trust supports schools to make the changes
needed and is the leading source of policy advice and support across government on all matters relating to school food. Our over-riding priority this year is to increase the
number of children eating lunches that comply with the new standards for school food. Nutrient-based standards are now in force in all secondary schools, designed to ensure that the food
O-ONE COULD forget the headlines when, in 2005, Jamie Oliver’s pioneering documentary,
Jamie’s School Dinners, shone a
light on school food in England and moved over 270,000 people to sign a petition demanding that
provided at lunchtime contains the correct levels of 14 nutrients including energy, carbohydrate, fat, saturated fat, protein, vitamins and minerals. The approach builds on existing food-based
standards, established in 2006, which ensure that school meals include no less than one portion of fruit and one portion of vegetables per child, per day; access to drinking water at all times; starchy foods, dairy foods and either meat or fish to be provided on a daily basis; and restrictions on meat products, salt, sweets and savoury snacks, and fried foods. Now that the standards have been set, our focus
is on helping schools to meet them and encouraging children to eat the healthy food on offer. We know that one of the main challenges facing secondary schools is competition from the high street – not least because figures show that there are, on average, 23 junk food outlets for every secondary school in England. So we are trying to help schools to beat the high
street at its own game by using similar marketing tips and techniques. Teenagers are savvy customers, and understandably respond to the well-honed approaches employed by brands trying to appeal to them. Harnessing some relatively simple marketing know-how can make all the difference to a school’s ability to drive take-up of school meals. In September, we launched a marketing and design
tool for schools and caterers to help them to promote school meals. MADGe (Marketing and Design Generator) is a free-to-use package developed to help schools market their food more professionally. Providing an online library of industry-designed
marketing materials including posters, letters, imagery, stickers, themed events, logos and even online adverts, MADGe gives schools and caterers the chance to harness professional skills at the click of a button. The toolkit of marketing products allows schools to learn creative techniques for promoting their food, including templates that can be adapted and personalised to suit the needs of each individual school. As Jamie Oliver’s series showed, one of the most
effective ways to get us thinking about what we eat is to see exactly how it is made. The Get Real campaign is a series of roadshows which demonstrate in uncompromising fashion the difference in quality
A great time to get debating
Psycho babble
WITH A General Election now called, attention has been drawn to the skills involved in successful debating. Prior to the US elections, secondary school and college debating teams increased in popularity more than 100-fold, as students learned to battle against each other using words and wits. There’s nothing like a competition and
controversial policies to spark the interest of students and motivate them, and the tendency for celebrities to involve themselves in politics makes the prospect of a good debate even more attractive. There are several reasons why it’s worth getting
all of your students involved in debating to some extent. First and foremost, we are educating citizens of the future, who should one day have a clear idea of what’s going wrong and how to fix it. If I were a secondary school
today I think I would be rather incensed by the blame for “broken Britain” being placed firmly on the shoulders of “feral youth”.Read out some of the more contentious comments being made about our youth, and get them going. Make it clear that the very
best ideas that come out in the debates will be passed on to local MPs. Far too few people in the UK vote these days, and if you inspire an interest in politics, and a belief that we all have a voice that can transform the way we live and make the change we want to see in our country, this situation can be changed. But why debating? It provides a concrete way for kids to learn outside
the traditional classroom, and it is an empowering activity through which they have control of their learning. If there is one thing that sparks enthusiasm, it’s a
good argument and a spirit of competition; a contest of reasoning and persuasion appeals to most kids, particularly today when they have a firm point of view and a strong belief in “rights”. Debating teaches critical-thinking skills, research skills, and strong organisation and presentation skills,
all of which can be applied to almost any field that students choose to enter in the future. Some studies indicate that students who participate in organised debating for as little as one school year are able to significantly improve critical-thinking skills, and show an equal improvement in articulation. Perhaps best of all, debating encourages kids to
use words and ideas to resolve conflict, which is enormously important at a time when youth violence is increasingly used to settle disputes. In the US, debating was once the stronghold of
private schools and taken up by kids from more affluent backgrounds; however, even inner city schools have adopted the practice, and their students now form a large percentage of the debaters in the Urban Debate League (UDL). The UDL says that because students
involved in debate regularly engage in writing, information analysis, and in- depth library and internet research, they often receive higher grades than non-debaters in secondary school and are more likely to continue on to post-secondary
education. While many of you may have a debating club or scheme operating in your school, it is worth considering the benefits of introducing it to the curriculum as a whole; in fact, extending tutor periods, offering extra credits or rewards for students taking part in lunch breaks or after school, or making it a key feature of PSHE will undoubtedly
reap benefits for students and educators alike. Advice on setting up a debating squad in your
school is at www.oxfordschools.org.uk; I would, however, recommend that you skip the “squad” bit and ensure that every student is encouraged to take part. It costs virtually nothing, and if you can get them going on subjects that appeal – sparked, perhaps, by the upcoming performances of our country’s leaders and the policies they are proposing – you’ll not just get them thinking, but learning, too.
KESullivan@aol.com
and nutritional value between fast food and school food (for example, a cheap burger may contain cow’s cheek, ear gristle or shredded skin) and ends with a training session where pupils are encouraged to act on what they have learned. Underpinning the tour is a tailored website called
Get Real, which acts as a hub for young people to view videos of how takeaways are made, and blog about food. Teachers can use the site as a lesson resource, and download a range of posters designed to appeal to teenagers. Elsewhere, the Trust’s Million Meals programme
aims to get a million more pupils eating a healthy lunch by the end of 2010. In return for a commitment from schools to make their community healthier, the Trust provides a library of free resources which explain how to make healthy eating work for their pupils. Schools can sign up to join Million Meals online
and get instant access to supporting materials such as a parent-taster pack, posters advertising free school meals to parents, recipes and case studies explaining what other schools have achieved, and how they did it. Part of the Million Meals programme is a regular School of the Month competition. One recent winner, the Folkestone Academy, regularly consults with pupils and includes their suggestions in the menu. Folkestone’s catering team form student taste panels for new dishes before they are allowed onto the menu, to make sure food passes the taste test. The academy also runs regular competitions and world menu days to give them an opportunity to try new foods.
SecEd
• Judy Hargadon is the chief executive of the School Food Trust.
Further information
• School Food Trust: www.schoolfoodtrust.org.uk • Get Real: www.getreal.uk.com
• Million Meals: www.schoolfoodtrust.org.uk/ millionmeals
Cooking on gas: Folkestone Academy is one of the recent winners of the School Food Trust School of the Month competition (inset)
SecEd • April 15 2010
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