Rebecca Bridgement, Managing Director, AiP
This National School Meals Week (9-13 November 2026) marks an extraordinary milestone: 120 years of school meals.
I’ve worked in the catering industry for more than 40 years, witnessing first-hand how food and the expectations around it have evolved. For the last nine years, my focus has been school catering, where I’ve had the privilege of seeing just how important a nutritious school meal is.
School food has seen significant changes. Expectations around school food are, rightly, much higher. There is a much greater focus on nutrition, sustainability, food provenance and the wider role that food plays in children’s health and wellbeing. Menus have become more varied and inclusive, reflecting changing tastes and the communities we serve. Children themselves have a much stronger voice in what appears on their plates.
Technology has changed the way we work too, from how we develop menus and manage allergens to how we understand what pupils enjoy and reduce food waste.
But perhaps one of the biggest changes has been a growing recognition that school food is an important part of education, not simply a service that happens alongside it.
A good school meal gives children the nutrition and energy they need to learn, concentrate and enjoy their day. It can introduce them to new foods and flavours, help establish healthy habits and, just as importantly, provide a moment to sit, talk and eat together.
There are significant challenges ahead for schools and catering providers. We continue to face pressure from rising food and labour costs, while making sure quality and nutritional standards remain high. We need to respond to changing dietary needs and expectations, continue reducing our environmental impact and, crucially, encourage children to choose and enjoy nutritious food.
We also need to continue attracting great people into our industry and giving them the skills, opportunities and recognition they deserve.
Those challenges are real, but so is the opportunity. If the last 120 years have shown us anything, it is that school meals can evolve with the needs of children and society while retaining something very simple at their heart: making sure children have access to good food at school.
I believe that every school meal is a big deal, and that is why I’m incredibly proud to be part of this industry.
And during National School Meals Week, I particularly want to say thank you to the people who make it happen. To our AiP teams in schools, who collectively prepare and serve around 64,000 meals every day, who encourage pupils to try something new and who bring care and enthusiasm to lunchtime, thank you.
And to our school and academy partners, thank you for trusting us to feed your pupils and for working with us to keep improving what school food can be.
120 years is an incredible milestone. Here’s to making the years ahead just as important.