Developing and using a School Menu Healthiness Assessment Tool to analyse school food provision in Wales

To design and develop a new, innovative and valid School Menu Healthiness Assessment Tool that is suitable for the quantitative and qualitative analysis of school food and drink provision. Second, to analyse primary and secondary school menus and price lists pan-Wales to ascertain their healthiness...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Public health nutrition Vol. 28; no. 1; pp. 36 - 43
Main Authors: Gilmour, Alice, Fairchild, Ruth
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Cambridge, UK Cambridge University Press 2025
Subjects:
Adolescent
Assessment and Methodology
Child
Content analysis
Cross-Sectional Studies
Data interpretation
Design analysis
Diet
Diet quality
Diet, Healthy - economics
Eating behavior
Food
Food availability
Food quality
Food Services - economics
Health care
Humans
Instrument
Local government
Meals
Medical personnel
Nutrition assessment
Nutrition research
Nutritional requirements
Nutritive Value
Prices
Public health
Qualitative analysis
Reproducibility of Results
Research Paper
School food standards
Schools
Secondary schools
Students
Wales
Wales
United Kingdom > UK
Instrument
Nutrition assessment
School food standards
Diet quality
ISSN:1368-9800, 1475-2727, 1475-2727
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:To design and develop a new, innovative and valid School Menu Healthiness Assessment Tool that is suitable for the quantitative and qualitative analysis of school food and drink provision. Second, to analyse primary and secondary school menus and price lists pan-Wales to ascertain their healthiness and whether free school meal (FSM) eligible pupils can afford to access healthy, nutritious food across the school day. Codable items and categories of school food and drink provision were operationalised before the tool underwent iterative development and testing. Then, cross-sectional content analysis of publicly available documents detailing school food provision (i.e. menus and price lists) was done. Primary and secondary schools in Wales, UK. In total, 82 canteen menus were sourced online. This comprised local authority catering for primary ( 22) and secondary ( 19) schools and school-organised catering for primary ( 5) and secondary ( 36) schools. Intercoder reliability testing found high agreeability between coders, demonstrating that the tool and data interpretation are reproducible and trustworthy. The FSM allowance is not wholly sufficient for all secondary school pupils to purchase a healthy meal from the school canteen. Moreover, the tool identified that oily fish and wholegrain provision were lacking across many menus. A valuable tool was created, useful for researchers and other health professionals (i.e. dietitians) who are required to analyse the healthiness of school food provision in line with the latest nutritional requirements. This study provides insight into the current school food and drink landscape pan-Wales.
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ISSN:1368-9800
1475-2727
1475-2727
DOI:10.1017/S1368980025000047