TUCK-SHOP DENOUNCED.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20541, 16 February 1935, Page 15

TUCK-SHOP DENOUNCED.

The Schoolboys’ Diet is Reformed. Dismay will fill many a schoolboy heart when he learns that that cherished institution, the “tuck shop,” is under grave suspicion. Its usefulness was assailed at the conference of educational associations recently held in London. The leader of the assault, Mr. W. A Sibley, headmaster of Wyeliffe College, Gloucester, revelled in the fact that at his own school this stumbling block to a reformed dietary had gone, and gone for ever. Nor will he tolerate the “tuck box.” But his prohibitions are not entirely free from the breath of inconsistency. No pepper, mustard or vinegar are allowed to the boys in his “house.” On the other hand, lie explained that he had not quite cut off salt, because “there is* a point beyond which one cannot expect the British schoolboy to offer himself on the altar of experimental science!” Mr. Sibley, whose school has had a “food reform house” for the past 25 years, was speaking at a sectional meeting of the Food Education Society. Before him, on the floor of the lecture theatre* were tables laden with dishes, but they were all of the vegetarian variety. General Rules. As food reformers the speakers seemed to be more or less unanimous in laying down the following general rules which should be followed in regard to school dietary: Three meats a day. No drinking with meals. Water to be sipped on rising and before retiring for the night. Potatoes cooked in their jackets. Raw carrots and artichokes. Plenty of salads. According to one speaker, salads were started at Christ’s Hospital as a luxury for the masters, and then the boys wanted them. Another master produced from his hat three brown rolls such as his own pupils appear to crave. Mrs. Guthketeh, senior warden of the University Students’ Hostels, North Wales, started the meeting on another trail by complaining of the amount of vinegar consumed by women students. They took it, she said, with fried fish, salads, and many other kinds of foods. Mrs. C. E. Hecht, the chairman, suggested that if they were not deliberately using it for slimming purposes lemons might be used as a possible substitute. Better Cook. During discussions on problems of school and university diet, a letter from Mr. Frank Preston, headmaster of Malvern College, was read. “The most important element in all school feeding,” he said, “is the cook, and unless this nation is going to. improve the supply and quality of cooks beyond the few incompetent people who toy with a gas cooker it is almost a waste of time to consider a diet suitable for anybody.” This applied even more to schools than anywhere else. Mr. H. N. P. Sloinan, headmaster of Tunbrid'-"' School, wrote “Things must be moving a bit in the homes, as I find more and more boys ready to enjoy salads, and tuck-boxes are fast dig appearing.” After covering a wide dietetic field, the meeting got back to the vital question of the “tuck shop.” “Is it not the proper business of schools,” asked Mr. Sibley, “to feed the boys instead of leaving them to their own devices? Can one trust the unregenerate, uncontrolled appetites of boys to feed themselves wisely if they have access to tuck shops and tuck boxes ?” S’v>h opposition as there was to his policy, he stated, came from the school shop authorities rather than from the boys, because so many schools depended on the profits of the school shop—mainly derived from tuck—to finance games and other interests. That seemed entirely wrong. If boys were allowed to bring back tuck boxes, some more richly stocked with dotted fond and jams than others, it would lead to an undesirable form of competition.