Recommendations for Food Literacy and School Food in Ontario: Proposal to Ontario’s Ministry of Education
Posted: September 1, 2023
Categories: Edible Education Network / GoodFoodBites / News from Sustain Ontario / School Food News / Schools
After continuing conversations stemming from Ontario’s Ministry of Education’s food literacy work, Sustain’s Ontario Food Literacy Working Group submitted a proposal to the Ministry of Education this July outlining recommendations for the government to further advance food literacy in Ontario. Thank you to the 28 organizations who reviewed and signed on to support the proposal!
We recommended that the Ministry of Education:
- Develop a Strategy for Food Literacy Education in Ontario Schools to support Ontario curriculum changes and updates related to food literacy education.
- Take a ‘whole school approach’ to weave food literacy into the broader school environment.
- Collaborate with the Ministry of Children, Community, and Social Services (MCCSS) to integrate food literacy into the curriculum in order to build stronger school food programs.
View our proposal in full here
We are looking forward to hearing from the Ministry of Education about next steps after they review our recommendations. We are hopeful that the government will continue their leadership in food literacy education that began with the 2020-2021 Bill 216 work led by MPP Daryl Kramp, which led to the 2022 changes to Ontario’s Science and Technology curriculum to include expectations related to food literacy.
In 2022-23, Sustain Ontario built the Food is Science website to support these curriculum changes. The site houses English and French educator resources including cross-curricular lesson plans, learning videos, and related readings that support teachers to understand and teach the curriculum through food. We encourage you to share this site with your followers as a helpful back to school resource!
We thank our Ontario Food Literacy Working Group and all the organizations in the province that have supported food literacy throughout the years to get Ontario to where we are today. We’re inspired to continue to work towards more food literacy education in schools in the future!