The Labour of Lunch
Transforming school food politics, one district at a time
Happy autumn!
Isabela here. It’s been a few weeks since our MEAT issue ended, and we are on the cusp of launching our eighth issue, BODY. In the meantime, we have a rich read for you this week: an interview with Jennifer E. Gaddis and Sarah A. Robert, the editors of a new book entitled “Transforming School Food Politics Around the World.”
Featuring a foreword by the iconic Silvia Federici, the volume features case studies from around the world on what it means to “transform” the politics and systems that underpin school food programs.
I find this to be a fascinating topic. I grew up in Canada, the only G7 country to not have a national school food program (although the government has finally committed to creating one). My main experiences with school food were therefore absorbed through a screen, giving me the impression that it looked a lot like this:
Of course, not having a school food program impacted me, my family, and my community much more than I would have realized in an era where most of my intellectual engagement was with angsty teenage comedies. It was a lot of work for my mom to pack my lunch — and we were fortunate enough to not be worried about where our next meal would come from, or whether the food we ate would align with dominant health discourses, or violate social norms of aesthetics and smells.
The issue of school food is essential in our time of polycrisis. Who feeds kids, how, where, when, with what and how much — analyzing the dynamics of power that underpin school food programs and spotlighting potential ways forward can help to tackle many of our so-called “wicked problems”, such as the climate crisis, socio-economic inequality, and unequal gender relations. (Jennifer previously wrote a book entitled The Labor of Lunch: Why We Need Real Food and Real Jobs in American Public Schools.) The work involved in feeding children and teens is still highly feminized and racialized and therefore bound up in questions of reproductive labour. School food programs have uneasy links to imperialist development policies and dietary racism. At such a large scale, school food has a key role to play in shifting towards more agro-ecological food systems. And the personal-political continuum that school food straddles makes it a potent area to study the interface of policy, power, and grassroots activism.
To take a deeper look at these topics, I recently sat down with Jennifer and Sarah to discuss why school food is a feminist issue, and what we can learn from the case studies they’ve compiled. The following interview is an excerpt from our conversation and has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Isabela: Your book is called “Transforming School Food Politics.” Many people might not have thought of school food, or the work done by people closest to it, as political. Can you explain what you mean by “school food politics”?
Jen: When people think about school food politics, they often consider the conflict between corporations pushing ultra-processed foods into schools for lucrative contracts and shaping young people’s tastes for future market participation. Additionally, there’s a debate about whether school food responsibilities should fall under state social welfare programs or be managed at home.
Sarah: Our book highlights how the politics of school food involve significant material and symbolic power, often rendered invisible. This invisibility is tied to feminist politics and gender dynamics, particularly the overlooked forms of work and care within the reproductive economy. Taking care of, caring for, and even caring about humans, think children in schools, may be linked to the so-called productive economy, may be paid, but even so there remains this notion that reproductive care work is to “service” productive work. It is undervalued symbolically and in material terms. Related to school food, this refers to the feminine workforce—mostly women workforce—within K-12 schools (e.g., teachers/teaching) and specifically cafeterias (e.g., “lunch ladies’). It also refers to the feminized nature of the work or the relationship of working conditions-to-pay-to-training or credentials.
Jen: We want to highlight how political decisions shape school food programs, which can lead to various outcomes. With this book, our goal is to create better food systems, joyful educational environments, and better jobs across the food chain. In the US, over $20 billion of federal taxpayer dollars are spent annually on school breakfast and lunch programs. This money can either reinforce existing power structures or drive positive change. By examining places with universal school meals and active public policies promoting just and sustainable food systems, we show that these changes are attainable. School food politics involves everyday participation in these systems to achieve these changes.
Isabela: The book’s introduction describes school food systems as “imperialist-white supremacist-capitalist-patriarchal”. Can you explain how school food is caught up in those oppressive systems?
Jen: International agencies and colonial powers often provided students with food that didn’t respect local food traditions, displacing staple foods. For example, in Japan and South Korea, school programs introduced wheat and dairy products instead of traditional rice-based foods. Similarly, in African countries, westernized foods were donated instead of supporting local agriculture. The United Nations’ homegrown school feeding program aims to counter this by promoting local agriculture, as seen in successful models like Brazil. This approach helps create a market for local producers and familiarizes young people with traditional foods, integrating them into their diets.
Sarah: Many chapters highlight the racialized, colonial, and imperialistic origins of school food systems, particularly those imposed by the United States post-World War II. These programs often used surplus U.S. food as part of foreign policy, shaping food systems in recipient countries over the past 70 years. Now, there’s a pushback against this imposition, with local communities engaging in policy protagonism—actively participating in and shaping food policies.
Jen: In the US, fluid milk is the only reimbursable beverage in the National School Lunch Program, which some students and advocates see as dietary racism. This is because many racial and ethnic minority communities have high rates of lactose intolerance, making the program non-inclusive. Alternatives to milk are often only available with a doctor’s note for a diagnosed allergy, reflecting power structures in meal patterns and school policies.
Isabela: You frame your book within feminist theories of labour and care, even featuring a foreword by Silvia Federici. Why is school food politics a feminist issue?
Jen: School food politics is a feminist issue because, whether in the home or in school kitchens and cafeterias, it is disproportionately women who do the work of feeding children. And whether it is paid or unpaid, this labour is typically undervalued, both economically and socially.
Sarah: And that work is unequally the responsibility of women. When considering the workers most involved or impacted by school food, we often think of women and feminized groups. This includes cafeteria workers, teachers, and mothers, who are primarily responsible for feeding and educating students about nutrition, foodways, and the experience of commensality. Given that most of these roles are filled by women, especially in the K-12 sector, this issue should be viewed through a feminist lens. Recognizing gender dynamics can help advocate for fair wages, better working conditions, and inclusive decision-making in political and economic spheres.
Jen: In the US, school food workers are over 90% women, while custodial workers are around 70% men. Despite both being support staff in the education sector, there’s a significant gender-based wage gap. Custodial jobs, which require less continuing education, often pay more and are more likely to be full-time and year-round. In contrast, school food service workers must meet annual professional standards and training requirements but earn less. This disparity is a feminist issue, as historically, custodial jobs were considered “breadwinner” roles for men, while food service jobs were seen as “mom jobs.” As more women become primary breadwinners, the need for fair wages and recognition of their skilled work becomes even more pressing.
Sarah: The treatment of school food workers and teachers by governing bodies, including the levels of regulation and training required in relation to work conditions, pay and benefits, raises fundamental questions of feminist political economics. This is a global issue, too, not limited to high-income versus low-income countries. The dynamics of gender inequality in school food work can be identified worldwide, as highlighted in the book through various case studies that transcend national contexts.
Jen: That reminds me that Jennifer Black, one of our co-authors for the Canadian chapter, recently sent me a new piece she wrote for The Conversation. It discusses the mental load that mothers, in particular, face when packing lunches for their kids. This issue highlights the difference between privatized responsibilities and what could be expected as a public good. When schools, as public institutions, are trusted to provide well for children, it alleviates some of the burdens on parents. However, when this responsibility falls on individuals, it can perpetuate inequalities based on what families can afford.
This situation also creates a space for competitive care and feelings of guilt and shame, especially among women. The connection between feeding their children and their self-perception as parents can be challenging. Women often strive to meet certain ideals of motherhood, which involves investing time, mental labour, and emotional energy in school meal provisioning.
Isabela: What would it mean to “transform” school food politics, particularly with regard to the aforementioned gender dynamics?
Sarah: School food isn’t just about the meals served to students; it’s about transforming the entire school food system. This includes national procurement, sustainable production, environmental care, and the well-being of farmers, farm workers, cafeteria staff, and teachers who educate about food and its values.
Jen: Approaching school food programs with a feminist lens shifts the focus from mere efficiency and calorie counts to broader questions about the systems and communities we want to create, as we see in a chapter authored by scholars and practitioners involved in creating Canada’s national school food program. Likewise, feminist agroecologists from Brazil, featured in another of the chapters, exemplify this by advocating for a change in our relationships with each other, the land, and food. School food programs, as centralized institutions, offer a starting point for these interventions, even in countries with limited state-sponsored food programs. In my view, transforming school food politics can foster a feminist food system where people experience joy and care for one another, the environment, and non-human relations.
Sarah: In the book, we highlight the role of school food programs in shaping community identity and cultural norms, particularly through the involvement of women. In the Peruvian case, women use school food systems to assert these identities and goals. Similarly, the Brazilian chapters on agroecologists emphasize that a feminist perspective on school food requires considering interpersonal and household dynamics. This perspective can lead to shifts in relationships within households, resulting in both financial autonomy and interpersonal power.
Isabela: The book mentions that people who challenge school food programs have power, even in the face of systemic oppression. What power do people have in challenging existing school food programs, and how can they leverage it?
Jen: Opting out of a school food program is a form of agency. Young people can choose not to eat the food, and parents or caregivers can decide not to have their children participate. These choices impact the program’s culture and financial viability, but they are often uncoordinated efforts with unintended consequences. They don’t represent a collective, intentional effort to influence the system. The key to having power is collectively challenging the system, which involves actively confronting and demanding change.
Sarah: I understand power to be engaged with and utilized by different stakeholders, individuals and collectives. School food politics involves engaging with state or local governance, where power is exercised in multiple ways. This can include attending board meetings, talking to teachers or cafeteria staff, making demands, or offering suggestions. Such engagement allows multiple stakeholders to exercise power within the school food system, highlighting it as a significant site for generating change and influencing policy decisions. This concept underscores how policy is created and implemented.
Changing school food systems requires significant resources and community involvement. For example, a mother advocating for vegetarian, halal, or kosher meals for her children needs support and resources. The current model isn’t working for everyone, and change requires acknowledging diverse ways of thinking about and engaging with food collectively.
Isabela: On that note, the book highlights non-traditional forms of knowledge that stakeholders hold around school food, including embodied knowledge and lived experience. Why is it important to uphold these forms of knowledge and what can we learn by doing so?
Jen: When considering school food programs as a form of care infrastructure, it’s crucial to value the embodied knowledge and lived experiences of participants. People can accept or reject state-sponsored care, and their experiences — whether feeling unwell from the food, not getting enough, or feeling ashamed — impact their willingness to participate. These emotional aspects must be considered in policy design, especially in feminist food politics.
Additionally, the experiences of workers in these programs, who may face difficulties due to policy decisions, should be acknowledged. Empowering those who experience the system firsthand to speak as experts is essential for addressing these issues and improving the programs.
When people share their lived experiences and highlight issues misaligned with their vision, it raises consciousness and fosters public testimony. This process helps communities understand different perspectives, resonate with shared problems, and negotiate system changes. In the Peruvian case, mothers in Amazonian communities exercise their power by adapting state rules to better serve their students’ needs. This collective action involves identifying targets for change and strategizing to implement these changes effectively.
Sarah: It’s also important to consider the knowledge held by youth. Policy makers can learn from the innovative ideas of young people, such as the concept of “Healthy Deliciousness.” Youth in Philadelphia came up with this concept to describe their vision for nutritious and tasty food.
Isabela: The volume contains case studies from countries like Japan, India, Finland, Peru, and Canada and highlights the differences in school food program goals and how programs are provisioned, governed, and funded. What insights are generated by bringing such diverse contexts into conversation?
Sarah: The importance of those diverse discussions is that communities around the world can learn from them, and garner approaches to the policy protagonism concept that I mentioned earlier, that translates to their visions of school food programs. The book, especially in the introduction, provides comparisons of policy protagonism across different scales, different continents, embedded within different histories of school food and public education systems to suggest there is no one way to source, procure, prepare, or nourish students within schools. There are many successful models. (And perhaps no excuses for not rethinking school food programs.)
Isabela: What effective school food program strategies stood out to you from the case studies, and why?
Sarah: One important way to achieve change is by having civil society learn the ins and outs of the policy-making process and how to influence it. The Brazil chapters detail how the farmers had to demand from local governing bodies the ability to compete and ultimately win procurement contracts and later to hold local officials accountable for meeting the food needs of children in rural schools. They were able to change not only their own role within the school food system, but also the material conditions on the ground to serve more students healthy food grown through agroecological practices. This happened because they learned what the policy is and how it is administered or “works” on the ground and then demanded to be included in that process.
The Korean case, which details rural-urban food procurement, also stood out as an example that I could envision in national contexts around the world to bolster rural-urban relationships and partnerships through much shorter supply chains that are culturally responsive and sustainable.
Jen: We also see threads of that happening in California and Vermont, where coalitions have successfully combined advocacy around universal free school meals and farm-to-school procurement to holistically reshape the “rules” of how school food programs operate locally. Those two chapters are part of a subsection of the book dedicated to sharing tools and campaigns for systems change. I encourage folks to read them and learn more about how storytelling can help build empathy for change and the role of teachers' unions in helping drive forward positive transformations in school food systems.
Sarah: The case of Finland continues to resonate with me because it illustrates how school food programming, for example setting a menu, can fulfill the fundamental role of public education to cultivate students’ civic responsibilities and abilities to participate in democratic governance. The Finnish and US case from North Carolina also highlight how many opportunities for building collective power remain untapped. In North Carolina, school district transportation staff, school food workers, and classroom teachers worked together to create a dynamic summer program to nourish rural families, distribute reading materials, and build stronger community-school relationships. Likewise, in Finland, home economics and school food workers unite to educate students about food, civics, and sustainability. So many of the chapters highlight the power of “we,” presenting examples of how dynamic collective action can bring about positive change. We also see this in the chapter from Vermont (US) about how a very broad coalition achieved their “happy ending” of a free universal locally sourced school meal, by listening to a range of voices and working in a bottom-up way.
Isabela: My doctoral research focuses on culturally inclusive food system transformation in the so-called Global North – i.e., how can we bring in notions of sustainable and healthy food that recognize the diversity of food practices and value of food knowledge held by immigrant communities. What did the book teach you about how schools can feed culturally diverse student bodies in appropriate and just ways?
Jen: Cooking food from scratch gives schools more control over food sourcing and preparation, allowing for flexibility and customization. This approach fosters closer relationships between food preparers, students, dietitians, and administrators, and enables discussions about community preferences. Schools can adapt menus to reflect diverse cultures and demographics. For example, schools could do customizable grain or noodle bowls or crowdsource recipes from families or local restaurants that meet nutritional standards and reflect community foodways. This helps expose students to different cultures through food.
Sarah: Overcoming the idea that culturally affirming food requests only benefit a specific group is important. In fact, these requests can benefit a broader population by expanding knowledge of diverse foodways and improving cafeteria meals, disrupting the corporate food model.
Many colonial settlers have learned about the Haudenosaunee Confederacy’s Three Sisters (corn, beans, and squash). Many non-Indigenous students and families living on the Haudenosaunee lands know of, grow, and eat these staples, but the Three Sisters are not often a part of meals in the cafeteria. This disconnect highlights the challenge and potential of integrating culturally affirming and sustainable foods into school programs. It’s crucial to honour these living, present foodways while being mindful of cultural appropriation. To make this shift requires confronting and calling out the legacy of oppression that treats Indigenous peoples and their food systems (and migrant communities too!) as a relic of the past and undervalued. It requires a rethink of school food as part of a liberatory public education.
Isabela: You recently released a curriculum guide for educators to structure their teaching around the book. How would you like to see this book used in academia and praxis in the future?
Sarah: Bringing together representatives from various stakeholders in school food systems to read relevant chapters that resonate with their local challenges can spark meaningful conversations. Using the curricular guide, these discussions can move beyond general reflections to practical applications in specific contexts.
Jen: As an instructor, I know that creating good activities and discussion questions outside one’s expertise takes significant time and effort. Providing resources can help facilitate classroom or community conversations, especially for those less familiar with the material.
Isabela: What are some areas of further research related to school food that you’d like to tackle?
Jen: There’s a lack of research on school food labour across different contexts. I also think we need more comparative international research on places that are doing school food really well at very large scales. For example, in megacities like those in Japan, South Korea, Brazil, and India, scratch cooking is the norm. We can learn a lot from these places, especially when they have very strong policy standards in place and ambitious aspirations for the future. In São Paulo, for instance, the government has set two ambitious goals: sourcing all school food supplies from producers who practice sustainable farming by 2026 and serving 100% organic meals by 2030. Understanding how these policies are implemented, including supply chain infrastructure and financing, is so important for transforming school food politics around the world. We talk about some of these ideas in the conclusion to the volume.
Sarah: As a teacher educator, I work with students becoming teachers and current classroom teachers. Food is always an integral part of school days and their work. Raising awareness among teachers and their unions about school food systems change and politics could lead to powerful and productive collaborations.
There’s also a lot of potential for the type of analysis of and changes to policy-making processes that Jen just mentioned within the field of Policy Studies, particularly Critical Policy Studies. And, I suspect there is an important conversation to be initiated within Feminist Food Studies and Gender and Education about the paid and unpaid labour that school food politics entails.
Jennifer Gaddis (left) is an associate professor of Civil Society and Community Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the author of The Labor of Lunch: Why We Need Real Food and Real Jobs in American Public Schools (University of California Press, 2019), which won book awards from the National Women’s Studies Association and the International Association of Culinary Professionals. Her work at the intersection of care and school food politics has been published in multiple journals, including Feminist Economics, Agriculture and Human Values, and Radical Teacher, and she has written op-eds on school food politics for popular media outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, The Guardian, and Teen Vogue.
Dr. Sarah A. Robert (right) is an international education and gender policy expert and an associate professor in the Graduate School of Education at the University at Buffalo (SUNY). She is the author of Neoliberal Education Reform: Gendered Notions in Global and Local Contexts (Routledge, 2017), awarded the Critics Choice Book Award from the American Educational Studies Association. Robert co-edited with Jennifer E. Gaddis Transforming School Food Politics Around the World (MIT Press, 2024); “Intersectionality and education work during COVID-19 transitions” for Gender, Work, and Organizations (2023); Neoliberalism, Gender, and Education Reform (Routledge, 2018); and the award winning, School Food Politics (P. Lang, 2011).
Just brilliant!