School Lunch Project Evaluation: Final Report 2024

The Tasmanian State Government initially
committed $1.52 million in 2021 to provide cooked
school lunches to students at 30 government
schools over two years (15 commencing in
2022 and an additional 15 commencing during
2023). The School Lunch Project is led by School
Food Matters, a Tasmanian non-government
organisation supporting school communities
to promote and provide nutritious food. The
project builds on a previous evaluation of a
pilot project delivered over 20 days in three
Tasmanian schools in 2020.
The Menzies Institute for Medical Research
(Menzies) has undertaken a developmental
evaluation of the School Lunch Project during
its initiation and development phase. As a
developmental evaluation the purpose is
not to draw definitive conclusions about the
effectiveness or impact of the project but to
determine if the project has achieved its intended
outcomes and to contribute to the project’s
ongoing development and refinement.
Schools could choose to prepare the meals from
scratch using supplied recipes and ingredients
or have meals prepared by a central kitchen (run
by Loaves and Fishes Tasmania, a not-for-profit
Tasmanian emergency food relief provider) and
delivered to the schools.

Two thirds of schools (N=20) chose the centralised
model. Lunches were served one to four days per
week. The number of students receiving meals
ranged from one class to the whole school.
Twelve of the 30 schools participated in a detailed
evaluation (seven primary schools,
two secondary school, three district schools)
in 2022–23. Data were collected via surveys,
interviews and discussion groups from parents,
students, teachers and other school staff,
principals and key stakeholders from School
Food Matters, Loaves and Fishes Tasmania, the
Tasmanian Department of Health (DoH), and
the School Lunch Project advisory group. The
18 schools not selected for detailed evaluation
were invited to provide basic information
through a principal survey and/or interviews. To assess the impact of providing cooked
school lunches on student attendance and
wellbeing, all 30 School Lunch Project schools
were matched with 30 comparison schools and
invited to provide consent for the Department for
Education, Children and Young People to provide
daily attendance data (2018–23) and Student
Wellbeing and Engagement Survey data (2019–23).
Seventeen School Lunch Project schools and
11 comparison schools provided consent.