Frequently asked questions about the Gordon Family Table

What if my child is a picky eater?

We feel your pain! More than a few parents and caregivers are ready to stop making lunch every day but also want to make sure that their child eats and enjoys what they are eating. 

One of the things that is most challenging about rolling out a new lunch program is that our students and parents only have current or past programs at Gordon as a reference point.

Next year's lunch program will have a range of choices that goes far beyond anything we have offered in the past: two hot entrées a day, sides, and a salad bar, soup and a sandwich bar. One of the two entrées will always be vegetarian. For those children who need predictable staples served daily, the salad bar and the sandwich bar will provide consistency day-in and day-out.

There will be multiple opportunities to assess the success of each menu: written feedback from students at school, an app for families to rate selections, and data gathered by the chef and servers onsite. As each menu cycle ends, SAGE will review menus to see which ones worked well and which ones were less successful, and make adjustments, working to ensure that the menu accommodates food allergies, eating preferences, and religious dietary practices. 

In the coming weeks and months, students will be brought into the planning conversation, but for now, families have already begun sharing data on their children’s food preferences using the form at www.gordonschool.org/qanda. SAGE also invites families to submit recipes from home to make for the community, now and anytime in the years ahead.

Gordon will not let a student go hungry. If for some reason, the food isn’t working for a child, the school would be in conversation with the family and with SAGE to engage in problem solving together.

A final note on this topic: this may be hard to believe as you consider your own child, but community-inclusive lunch programs can introduce repeated exposure to new dishes and positive peer pressure that can compel students to try—and enjoy—a wider range of foods. We can make no guarantees, but this is a possibility.

I am having trouble picturing how this will work. Can you walk me through it?

We are still designing and finalizing details, but here are some things we know at this point that weren’t included in the initial announcement at www.gordonschool.org/familytable

Menus will be announced in four-week cycles with rich variety week-to-week, giving families a chance to preview the options and talk them through. 

Gordon faculty and staff as well as the SAGE team will be available to help children make their choices and keep the food lines moving. 

Lunch will be served primarily in the dining hall, but we’ve already decided that Early Childhood will eat in their classrooms. SAGE has a long history of working with schools that have early childhood and lower school programs, and we are confident that our faculty can partner with SAGE to make sure all ages get their food quickly, calmly and easily.

Students will be choosing what to put on their plate, and they will be able to get seconds if they wish. Again, we will be relying on SAGE's deep experience to make this go quickly and smoothly, and we have been assured by current SAGE partner schools that SAGE is indeed good at making this work.

SAGE will also be taking over the current snack program, and will be available as Gordon’s first-choice caterer for events and celebrations on campus.

Construction on the commercial-grade kitchen was originally planned to begin March 15th and to extend through the summer. In partnership with the contractor, we have adjusted the start date toward the end of April to reduce disruption during the school day. The targeted completion date remains August 15th. The full cost of the project will be covered by individual philanthropy and outreach to foundations, with no impact on families' annual tuition or fees. 

The design of the kitchen is finished, done in collaboration with SAGE to draw on their experience in food preparation but also in moving students quickly and calmly through serving lines. The kitchen will go where the current servery is in the dining hall. It will take up slightly more space than the current setup, but it is laid out in a way that does not encroach significantly on the space currently used for student seating.  A cold storage unit will also be installed behind the school.

When did all this come together? The timing of the announcement seemed rushed.

This program has been coming together slowly, deliberately and transparently for years, but over the past six weeks, Gordon's leadership has had to make some difficult, quick choices.

Gordon has been working towards a new lunch program since the strategic vision was finalized in 2018.

When this school year began, Gordon was transparent about the fact that the current lunch program was temporary, and that a new lunch program was being designed to begin in September 2023.

In September, Dr. Thomas López convened parents and caregivers for a series of presentations on the future of lunch at Gordon, and followed up with a talk about the strategic vision in general in October. At each of these, she made it clear that the new lunch program would need to be community-inclusive with every family participating.

What was not clear in the fall, however, was how a community-inclusive lunch program would impact families’ FIT prices. Unfortunately, Gordon did not have firm numbers on the financial impact of the lunch program until early January. 

Families learned about the changes to their FIT prices just days before their re-enrollment contracts were issued, and less than three weeks before these contracts were due. This timing left some families feeling surprised and rushed, which was deeply regrettable. 

Gordon has taken great pride in the predictable nature of the FIT three-year cycle, and this announcement represents an interruption in that cycle. The Leadership Team determined that the alternatives were even less acceptable. Gordon could have put off announcing the cost of the lunch program until after contacts were signed, but this would have involved an unacceptable lack of transparency on the school’s part. The school could have delayed the rollout of the new lunch program by a year, which would have left Gordon with another year of a program that could not meet all of the school's needs. With the support of the Board of Trustees, Gordon's leadership chose to move forward and ensure families had all of the numbers necessary before signing their contracts.
 

Can my child still pack their lunch? Why does everyone need to participate?

On a practical level, we need every family to participate in order to have a sustainable program that offers a rich variety of fresh delicious options, at a level that our previous opt-in programs could not achieve. The all-in approach also allows us to reduce food waste dramatically every day.

With this move to a Gordon family table, we also have a chance to create an inclusive, equitable, daily dining experience that builds relationships and connects to the curriculum. Students will encourage each other to try new foods. They will talk about what they are experiencing with their teachers, who are eating off the same menu. They will interact with the chefs and kitchen staff about how their meals are prepared and how their ingredients are sourced.

The lunch program we are designing will have many choices: hot entrées, sides, a salad bar, soup and sandwich bar. It is hard to imagine that there will not be something for every child to enjoy. SAGE is grounded in a community-inclusive approach and believes they are only successful when everyone has a meal to enjoy. They will do this by providing a variety of menu items that accommodate a diversity of preferences and needs. 

There should be no reason that a student needs to bring in food from home except in rare situations such as those who need specific medical accommodations.
 

But packing lunch is one way I show love and connect my child with their culture!

Yes. Food is powerful. During the lunch retreat with faculty, parents, caregivers and food professionals in January, we discussed the idea of a family table as a recognition of the fact that food is just not about what is on our plates. It is a reflection of values, culture, memories, connection. And it’s emotional.

We recognized this when we considered designing a lunch program, and the concept of a family table is about leveraging these connections to strengthen the school experience. 

The phrase “family table" refers to a common experience of sharing what’s on the table, of making choices. It’s about “I loved this!” or “That’s not for me.” Or “You have to try this!” or “No, thank you.” SAGE is interested in families sharing their recipes and watching them become something an entire community can enjoy. We are interested in parents seeing the menus and being in conversation with their children about what they may have or what they might try. We’re interested in parents visiting the dining hall and getting a sense of what their children experience each day.

We admit, this is very new and for some families we acknowledge that we are asking for a lot of trust. And we know that we may not achieve all that we hope for in year one. But this plan is based on a deep respect for what food means to people and our intention to create a lunch program that aligns with our mission and is ultimately experienced as an expression of love and care for our community.

Why is the faculty getting their lunch provided?

It’s important that all faculty and staff participate in the lunch program, in the spirit of the community-inclusive experience but also on a practical level as they help manage and supervise students in partnership with SAGE staff.

While the hope is that faculty and staff will experience daily catered lunch as an additional job benefit, on the most basic level we did not believe it was fair to compel faculty and staff to pay to participate in something that is a job requirement.

Is there any thought to expand nutrition education in light of the fact that with this lunch program, our children will be asked to consistently make choices around food and nutrition?

In Gordon’s health curriculum, which currently begins in earnest in third grade, discussion of meals is focused on energy needs, variety, nutrient density and proportionality of food groups. How we choose to expand or build upon this has not been fleshed out at this point, however, we agree that the opportunities here are tremendous and important.
 
Adult engagement with students about their choices will be an important part of the work of creating a Gordon family table. Lunch time must be a time of fun and ease for our students. Enjoyment of the experience is an essential element of the concept of a Gordon family table, with no guilt, no shaming, no judging or critiquing of people’s choices. 

SAGE has developed fun ways for students to determine what a healthy plate looks like, with visual cues on the service line. Each item is marked in dark, medium or light green depending on nutritional value. Visual clues are provided to remind children that plates should be 50% dark green, 30% medium green and 20% light green. 

Still, nutrition is not a one-size-fits-all phenomenon, and this work is done with a light touch. We have partnered with SAGE because their standards align with our values including cooking from scratch and using fresh fruits and vegetables. Their philosophy is grounded in a community-inclusive approach and they have demonstrated the ability to be in partnership with schools to ensure the lunch program is mission aligned.  
 

What proportion of the options will be organic? What else do we know about how ingredients are sourced?

While organic cannot be promised all the time, the foundation of our approach with SAGE will be focused intentionally on thoughtful local sourcing and sustainability. We will be inviting representatives from SAGE to Gordon in the coming months and invite you to come with your questions! 

Whenever possible, partners with local vendors for ingredients. They have a longstanding, and growing, relationship with Farm Fresh RI, which connects schools and institutions directly with local growers and producers.

In addition, SAGE is committed to the following:

• Working with local grocery distributors rather than big, national suppliers
• Cage-free certified humane eggs, hormone-free milk, and No Antibiotics Ever (NAE) chicken
• Seafood sourced using guidelines from the Marine Stewardship Council and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch
• Seasonings without MSG
• Vegan and vegetarian options every day

SAGE is also committed to sustainable practices. They meet the requirements for national sustainable dining certifications like Certified Green Restaurant and Fair Trade School. They have experience working with school gardens and will partner with us in our sustainability efforts like composting, measuring and reducing food waste, and recycling.