St. James’ C.E.P. School Meals Policy

At St. James’, we employ an award winning provider of school meals to cater for our children.  Dolce currently supplies catering to many schools throughout the UK and places an emphasis on using fresh, local produce to create healthy food that is cooked in a way that suits the tastes of young children.

Dolce use a computerised ordering system called Live Kitchen to ensure our children receive the meals that they want and provide a cashless payment system.  The website address is https://schoolgrid.co.uk/

Parents and carers will be asked to order their child’s school meal at home; ordering dinners via the internet at home means that you as parents/carers know the food your child will eat for lunch, the nutritional value the food contains and where the food is sourced from. Also, if your child has any dietary requirements, you can enter this into the system and that particular ingredient will be removed for your menu option. It is important therefore that we have everyone's details to enable us to set up an account. For those parents and carers who do not have access to internet at home the children will be able to order their lunch each morning in school.

KS1 children (Reception, Y1 & Y2) have their meals paid for due to Universal Free School Meals, however KS2 (Years 3,4,5,6) must pay for their school meals, unless in receipt of Free School Meals. I would encourage all children in Reception, Year 1 and 2 to have a school meal as it is your entitlement and saves you time making a packed lunch for them!  

If you do pay for school meals, you will only pay for the meals that your child has taken, so if you do place an order on-line and your child misses the meal for any reason you will not be charged. Don’t worry if your child cannot remember what you’ve ordered for them! At lunchtime, your child will say their name to the kitchen staff and their order will pop up on screen.

School dinners cost £2.74 per day, for KS2 children. All payments will be made online. If you wish to pay for a meal for your child on a particular day this must be done online. If you are unsure if your child qualifies for a free school meal please check at the office.  We hope that everyone who can, will sign up to the Direct Debit method of payment.  If you have any queries please contact the school office or contact Dolce Catering on 01942 707709 or info@dolce.co.uk and Live Kitchen on 01506 300310.

We have some very important news to share that could impact our families.

We have received notification that children could miss out on Free School Meals (FSM) if families don’t register and apply THIS MONTH (by 31^st March 2025) regardless of which year group they are currently in. There is a link and some information below about FSM eligibility.

Here are all the possible scenarios – please see which applies to you:

Action required:

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If your child is currently in KS1 (Rec, Y1 or Y2) they will currently be automatically receiving Universal Free School Meals - UFSM). However, if they may also be eligible for ‘Means Tested’ free school meals, which would ensure your child receives free school meals until they leave our school at the end of Year 6. If you think you are eligible for ‘Means Tested’ free school meals, but you have not registered and applied, you MUST do so before 31^st March 2025. You will not be able to apply after this date. You cannot wait until they are in KS2 to do it

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If your child is currently in KS2 (Y3-Y6) and they may be eligible for FSM but you have not registered and applied, you MUST apply before 31^st March 2025. You will not be able to apply after this date.

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No action required:

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If your child is currently in KS2 (Y3-Y6) and they are already registered and receiving FSM, you do not need to do anything; they will continue to do so until the end of Year 6.

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If your child is not eligible for FSM, you do not need to do anything. Your child will continue to get UFSM in KS1 and then will need to pay for their dinners in KS2

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The 1^st statement above is likely to impact the most families because many families do not apply in KS1 knowing that their children get UFSM automatically and then they apply in KS2.

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If you think you might be eligible but have not applied yet, please do your application before 31/03/25. Remember, this includes children in all KS1 classes who currently receive UFSM. If you want your child to get their FSM from Year 3, please get your application in by this date.

This is the link to use to apply for free school meals:

https://www.gov.uk/apply-free-school-meals