Good eating habits through school menus
Learning to eat well at school is already possible with the Excellence Plan for Food and Nutrition, which has launched GSD - the first educational cooperative in Spain - and which aims to encourage students to benefit from a healthy diet based on the discovery of new flavors and obtaining adequate eating habits during their stay at school.
According to the latest study published by the World Health Organization (WHO) on overweight and childhood and childhood obesity, the number of obese children and adolescents in the world has multiplied tenfold in the last four decades, and the forecasts suggest that in five years there will be more young people with overweight than underweight worldwide.
To prevent this trend, GSD -the first educational cooperative in Spain- develops in all its educational centers a Excellence Plan for Food and Nutrition. It is a project with which we want to promote nutritional education as a fundamental value that seeks to raise awareness among children and adolescents about the role that nutrition plays in their health.
Learn to eat well at school
In this way, the teaching group is a valuable channel for transmitting new knowledge when teaching the guidelines on the correct combination of foods, the frequency of consumption of each of them and the appropriate amount according to personal circumstances. All this is the first step to create a responsible attitude towards the way of feeding.
This Plan of Excellence for Food and Nutrition includes a diet adapted to students with special needs such as celiac disease, allergies, cholesterol or overweight according to the procedure "Management of allergies, intolerances and special nutritional needs AINNME".
Its operation part of the kitchen service that meets these needs following the corresponding medical report submitted by families. In this way, menus for special nutritional needs are prepared monthly starting from the general menu and eliminating or replacing those ingredients or dishes containing allergens by others.
Special for celiacs
In the case of children with celiac disease, a specific procedure is established. The treatment consists of a diet completely devoid of gluten and strictly stripped. To complete this process, the schools acquire the products and elaborate them in a way that does not differ in their presentation from the rest of the students. In addition, products that are not natural and that are at risk of containing gluten are specifically received from a supplier.
The preparation of all menus, both general and specific, are designed on a monthly basis by publishing on the website of each school, which includes the date and educational level to which it is intended in addition to the basic ingredients and allergens with the aim of offer the most complete information to parents. These menus are made in the centers themselves and are intended for students from 4 months to adulthood.
Marina Berrio
