The Health Education Trust

HET had been campaigning for ‘healthier’ foods and drinks in schools for many years, and established Real Choice to support schools and industry that are making positive steps to deliver good nutrition to children. Real Choice is an independent scheme established and operated by the Health Education Trust since April 2005, prior to the School Food Standards.

The scheme works simply to flag up on our online, freely accessible register all products that have been independently nutritionally evaluated by us and so meet the Governments standards for food in schools as a minimum.

At its simplest level schools want to know if snack and drinks products conform to the Governments legislation on ‘Foods other than lunch’ before they take the decision to sell such products in school. HET’s Real Choice product register highlights those products that have been independently evaluated by our Registered Nutritionist and Dietitian and do comply with the Government regulations for food in school.

Real Choice offers a ‘holistic gold standard’ for healthy snacking and vending, aimed at children.

Click here for full details.
click here for full details

The Background to Real Choice: 

HET had been campaigning for ‘healthier’ foods and drinks in schools for many years, and established Real Choice to support schools and industry that are making positive steps to deliver good nutrition to children. HET established through pilot trials in schools that healthy vending can be possible and viable in schools. Click here for further details.

Real Choice is an independent scheme established and operated by the Health Education Trust since April 2005, prior to the formation of the School Meals Review Panel and the School Food Trust, and the establishment of the School Food Standards. The scheme was created to help cut through the confused messages surrounding what is and what is not ‘healthy’ or suitable for school snacking and vending.

The scheme works simply to flag up on our online, freely accessible register all products that have been independently nutritionally evaluated by us and so meet the Governments standards for food in schools as a minimum.

At its simplest level schools want to know if snack and drinks products conform to the Governments legislation on ‘Foods other than lunch’ before they take the decision to sell such products in school. HET’s Real Choice product register highlights those products that have been independently evaluated by our Registered Nutritionist and Dietitian and do comply with the Government regulations for food in school.

Real Choice offers a ‘holistic gold standard’ for healthy snacking and vending, aimed at children. Products that are registered fully with Real Choice comply to the School Food Standards, but also offer something extra as products are reviewed holistically, taking into account such issues as packaging, price and sustainability. Developing practical, common sense approaches is the key to improving the health of young people, so our rationale for establishing the Real Choice scheme has been to raise the standard of snacking through establishing best practice, cutting through complex scientific labelling and considering products as a whole.

Real Choice provides an open and freely available product list for manufacturers, parents, pupils, caterers and schools.

What’s on offer?

Companies register with HET, and then HET’s registered nutritionists carry out an independent product evaluation to determine their compliance with either or both the School Food Standard and HET’s Real Choice holistic gold standard. Drinks are further reviewed to determine compliance with the School Food Trusts Voluntary Code of Practice.

Based on successful product evaluation, products will be registered under the following categories:

Companies are also offered advice on how to reformulate their products in order to ‘move up’ the categories.

Products that have been evaluated by HET will be able to state this on their product literature and on pack to make it clear that they do comply with the School Food Standards/ VCoP and that they have been independently checked by HETs registered nutritionists. Please note that only products that meet the full holistic Real Choice criteria would be eligible to carry the Real Choice logo.

If you would like any further information on the scheme or would like to register, please contact Kathryn Styles, Contact us.