19 February 2026
The Food For Life Schools Award Framework - and by extension, the School Food Standards - considers the food quality and food culture of every meal eaten in schools. This means the hot dinners provided by schools but also the packed lunches. All children should have access to good and healthy food.
The Local Programme Officer in Leicestershire has been on the ground delivering workshops to support schools who reported a growing need to address the quality of food in packed lunches.
The aim of the workshops is not only to raise the standard of food provision for all children but to embed a positive food culture for the whole community.
Parents are invited to attend along with their child to learn about what constitutes a healthy and balanced meal, to try cost effective alternatives to highly processed, sugary snacks and drinks, and to explore some new foods in a safe and pressure-free environment.
The cous cous went down well with my daughter – will definitely have to try it at home.
By delivering to both parent and child, the same message can be taken away and shared at home, and parents can see and encourage their child when trying new things in a different context.
Schools that asked for a packed lunch workshop to be delivered understand the role of healthy and sustainable food in a child's development but often need more support for their families and stakeholders to get on-board.
They each had different motives for running a workshop - including parental pushback on instituting a packed lunch policy as a school, a general slipping of lunchbox standards over time, an increase in reported ‘fussy’ eaters, and as part of a holistic push to increase parental engagement.
I’m going to encourage more exposure to fruit & veg, and we’re going to make the popcorn!
The direct result of the packed lunch workshops is that schools can complete two actions on their journey to Bronze Food For Life Schools Award: reaching out to families to inform them about and include them in their food activities, and instituting policies to support a healthy and sustainable food culture. But the potential benefits are much longer reaching, too.
After the session, staff are left with the know-how to be able to run their own workshops in future years that can be tailored the needs of the cohort and foster supportive relationships with parents, which in the long-term will help positively shape children's relationship with their food.
The workshops are just one way that Food For Life supports schools to achieve their food goals. They endorse school leaderships’ position on how policies like a packed lunch policy strengthen a healthy and sustainable food culture in school, and help schools advocate for positive food cultures beyond their own setting.