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I'm not a dinner lady. I'm a school cook.

12th February 2008, 10:29am

As the Government launched the FEAST academies that will see 'dinner ladies' up and down the country get the training Jamie Oliver has battled for, one dinner lady has hit out and demanded an upgrade.

Geraldine Brookes from St Raphael's Roman Catholic Primary in Northolt, West London told the Daily Mail that the job title of a dinner lady should be revised.

She explained more: "Dinner lady tends to be used across the board for anyone working within a school meals environment. But the cooks are different from the servers and some cooks are now upping the ante and are going to university. They have realised their jobs are skillful jobs.

"You are responsible for hygiene, for ordering, for stock-taking, for time sheets, for arranging cover when staff are off sick and that's why I think the title dinner lady is not really happening. There's so much involved in running a 'unit' as kitchens are now called.

"The more experienced call themselves chefs. The girls out front are so much more than dinner ladies food technical advisers or something along those lines would be better!"

Geraldine is studying for an NVQ qualification in professional cookery through Thames Valley University and has recently been made a school cook.

Sixteen training centres up and down the country will train 30,000 school staff in catering and nutrition in the next three years.

Prue Leith, Chair of The School Food Trust said at the launch of the FEAST centres: "I am delighted to be officially launching the School FEAST network today. It's particularly fabulous to be rolling my sleeves up and preparing a meal with some of the cooks already training at TVU, one of the School FEAST centres.

"School cooks play such a vital role in the health and wellbeing of our children. The School Feast network will help provide them with the training and skills they need to progress. "

The School FEAST Network brings together existing providers of excellence and new and innovative training centres. All centres and partnerships will provide a range of training and development opportunities for the school food workforce. Each will have the flexibility to deliver specialist training to this diverse group.

Ed Balls, Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families also commented: "School cooks are the heartbeat of our school food revolution – transforming lunches and children's health. They deserve the best training – they do highly skilled jobs giving millions of children nutritious dinners every single school day. These centres and our continued funding means they can brush up their skills or learn new ones, so they can prepare meals for their whole schools from healthy, fresh ingredients."

Related Articles:

16 Oct 2009 - Prue Leith opens School FEAST centre at Worcester College
13 May 2009 - North east feasts on school food training

Words Clare Riley 0 comments

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