Background Information:
Applemore is a self-governing Foundation Specialist Technology College in Hampshire with around 600 pupils on roll. The school’s motto (chosen by the pupils) is “Going Forward Together”. This reflects the importance the school places on working together in an environment where relationships are based on mutual respect. The school has a private contract with a catering provider and employs their own kitchen staff and dining room assistants. Around 80% of the school food is prepared fresh on site every day. A full hour is allocated for lunchtimes.
Why did the school want to make improvements to the school meal provision?
Dining Area:
The original dining area had minimal seating which catered for up to 16 pupils. An additional 24 seats and dining tables were also set up in the hallway which resulted in severe congestion at lunchtimes. Many pupils using the canteen had to wait for seating to become available. Due to limited seating capacity food that can be eaten “on the go” has proved popular. Pupils were also opting to buy food at lunchtimes from the local supermarket. For those eating in the school canteen, they were served on plastic disposable plates and eating as they walked. Initially the school had one servery area and two till points.
Kitchen area:
Before the school set out making any improvements, they spent time collecting the relevant baseline data to enable them to understand the present situation. Kitchen staff were observed and the various activities undertaken were timed. Equipment and the kitchen location were reviewed. The existing layout of this kitchen was narrow and u-shaped, curving around the office and storerooms. The narrow corridor created congestion and staff cross-over when accessing equipment and food preparation areas. Kitchen staff made the best use of the space available in respect to flows by assigning tasks (or meal types) to specific prep areas. The following issues were identified:
- The ovens took a long time to heat
- The food took a long time to cook
- The ovens had relatively small capacity and one was broken
- The school was spending approximately £1,755 annually on disposable plates and cutlery.
How was the project funded?
Hampshire Council funded the refurbishment work. The School Food Trust provided funding towards the kitchen and dining room equipment.
Who was involved in making the improvements:
- Catering Managers
- Cooks
- Lunchtime Assistants
- Senior Management Staff
What improvements were made?
Dining room:
The school decided to convert unused classrooms adjacent to the kitchen, into new dining areas. Draft floor plans were drawn up and presented to the Student Council, Deputy Principle and Hampshire Council representatives for feedback.
Overall everyone wanted the same goal ‘an improved dining experience for the students’. However perceptions of what this looks like varied amongst stakeholders and cost implications had to be considered.
The School worked alongside the Sorrell Foundation (www.thesorrellfoundation.com) and SHH Architects (www.shh.co.uk) to ensure that the pupil’s voices were heard and their ideas translated into practical designs. Pupils were very much involved in creating a dining room design bespoke for the school whilst also meeting their needs. They were supported to create mood boards to showcase some of their ideas for the new dining areas. Overall the general design of the dining area was industrial so as to accommodate the exposed features within the existing shell. This also helped to minimise refurbishment costs. The contracting team also contributed to design ideas such as painting and leaving the piping exposed so that it helped heat the area.
Below the pictures illustrate the refurbishment work undertaken to the existing dining space
Below you can see the refurbishment work undertaken to the two previously unused classrooms:
Initially, the original design incorporated two tills at either end of the serving counter. However, following the launch the catering team found this created congestion and decided to move one of the tills to the middle of the servery area. This split the larger queue into two smaller queues. Upon entering the dining hall students can now choose to go right and head around the back wall to the ‘food to go’ station, or left and head to the main servery area. There is a teacher or supervisor at the door to control queue levels
To improve flows and queuing time a biometric system was implemented at the tills. Furthermore, an area was designated near to the servery for tray returns and a water station. Plates and cutlery were also introduced to improve the dining experience.
Due to the tight budget, money was directed towards creating innovative outdoor dining areas. Therefore, SHH Architects created a low cost, dining solution from old shipping container which were painted to match the indoor dining décor.
Kitchen area:
The following items of equipment were installed in the kitchen area to improve efficiency:
- Dishwasher
- New convection oven.
Changes made to kitchen area layout can be viewed in the diagram below.
A replacement dishwasher was installed with an accompanying tray area. The old dishwasher was sourced from a pub and had minimal capacity. It was turned on at 7:30am and took until 9:30am to warm up. The dishwasher required at least 6 kettles of boiling water to fill it at the start of day and often required further top-ups. The new dishwasher had a cycle time of 2mins and was integral in enabling the kitchen staff to offer plates/cutlery/trays to students when they launched the new dining hall.
The existing oven range operated at 50% capacity, as the bottom level did not work. School Food Trust funded an additional 6 burner oven range to increase the potential cooking capacity of the kitchen. This was particularly an issue on Roast Wednesday’s when the kitchen team were simply unable to cater for the level of demand.
An additional electric fan oven dedicated to cooking of desserts was installed in the kitchen. Apart from improving overall cooking capacity this removed the need for the person preparing desserts to access the other ovens.
Given the popularity of ‘Grab and Go’ food the kitchen staff noted that there was insufficient storage space for salad items. A new salad fridge was provided which freed up additional space for food wrapping and packaging.
What have been the benefits to the school?
Take up increased on average by an additional £100 per day (based on two weeks following FSM trial). Since the improvements to the school meal service take up has remained at around 34%
Dining space:
Now the school has a large dining area with seating capacity for 200 pupils. Pupils are very positive about their dining area and feel a sense of ownership for the space they designed; in partnership with the architects. Again pupils have been very respectful of the space, returning trays and scraping plates clean themselves. Many pupils now take advantage of the easily accessible water station.
Kitchen area:
Approximately 80% of students on roll took a free school meal during the trial.
In addition, the introduction of the new dishwasher enabled the kitchen to use plates/trays/cutlery and reduced the costs associated with using disposable items. Pre-intervention spending on disposable food packaging was £1,755 per year around £14 per day and post-interventions this has been reduced to £5 per day. Re-organisation of the equipment has improved movement and congestion in the kitchen area. Furthermore, the addition of the 6 burner range and electric fan oven have increased efficiency and enabled the school to cater for the increase in demand.
Learning and Top Tips:
The key challenges within the dining hall itself were in respect to the conversion of 4 adjacent classrooms into one larger dining space. There were issues of asbestos and supporting frames and structures limiting some design options. Some of these features were incorporated into the industrial theme.
Furthermore, maintaining the lunchtime provision proved challenging during the renovation work. The installation of new items of equipment was relatively straight forward. However, the majority of work undertaken to the servery area resulted in kitchen staff transporting meals to a temporary servery. This was located in an adjacent classroom that was not being renovated.
Contact details:
If you would like further information please feel free to contact the School Food Trust on 0800 089 5001 or alternatively please email enquiries to info@childrensfoodtrust.org.uk
