The intensive workday in high schools: the obstacle for thousands of students to receive a canteen grant

BarcelonaIn the last fifteen years there has been a very significant evolution in the school lunch grant policy in Catalonia, but this has not eliminated all access barriers. This is the main conclusion reached by the Ombudsman regarding the situation of universal access to the dining hall service in Catalan schools and high schools. Among these access barriers, the first one pointed out by the Ombudsman is the lack of dining halls in secondary education centers, which has led to the implementation of the compacted intensive school day. This situation has been denounced for years and, despite the improvements of recent years, it remains worrying: 310 of the 563 public high schools have neither a dining hall nor a canteen service, which means that their students cannot access a school lunch grant either, as denounced by the report School lunch grants within the framework of the service universalization strategy in Catalonia, by the Ombudsman herself.

The document made public this Thursday by the Ombudsman celebrates that since the 2010-2011 school year the number of students receiving school lunch grants has tripled, going from 65,000 to more than 205,000, and that in this time the public investment for these grants has increased from 33.2 to 250 million euros annually. However, it also warns that “despite this effort”, there is still 30% of vulnerable students who continue without access to the grants or the dining hall service. And in this void, the report points to secondary schools as “the great pending subject”: while the grants reach 91.3% of vulnerable students in infant and primary education, this coverage falls to 26.9% in secondary education (ESO).

Dining halls in charter schools, more expensive

Beyond whether an educational center has a dining hall or not, the ombudswoman also warns that another of the problems is the price. In this sense, she alerts that in charter schools and high schools, the average price of the service “is significantly higher than that of public centers” and this means that “even with 100% aid,” there are families that have to assume a part of the cost of the dining hall.

The report also warns of other barriers to accessing dining grants such as the irregular administrative status of parents, the lack of knowledge about how the aid works, or the fact that some students with special educational needs do not have the necessary support during the lunch period.

Faced with all these difficulties, the ombudswoman recommends that all high schools have a dining service regardless of what type of schedule they follow; to approve a new decree to recognize the dining hall as a subjective right; to guarantee free access for vulnerable students; to simplify the procedures and to reinforce inclusion and educational support.