Headteacher bans 'greedy' primary school pupils from bringing in sweets
A primary school headteacher has banned her pupils from bringing in sweets.
Chasey Crawford-Usher, the headmistress of Wateringbury Primary School near Maidstone Kent, has banned the practice of children bringing the sugary treats to school in order to celebrate their birthday with classmates.
“To have sweets on your birthday is one thing, but having them on every other child’s birthday is another,” she told The Telegraph.
“We had sweets in school before and the children were getting greedy and unpleasant about it, grabbing them and that sort of thing.
“There was no aspect about it that was pleasant.”
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“It’s really important that parents understand that we’ve got the children’s well-being at heart. It’s not because I don’t like sweets,” she added.
“There’s this assumption that every celebration has to involve sugar and I think we need to change children’s perceptions about that as well as parents’ perceptions.”
Crawford-Usher has previously banned fruit juice at the school, while pupils are only permitted to bring in crisps once a week, according to Kent Online.
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Discussing the matter on Twitter, some supported the ban, saying sweets had no place at a school.
Yes it should be banned. School bags are for school stuff not filling kids with cheap sweets.
— MG (@MGphlox) March 11, 2019
not a grouch. I just don’t think its a schools place to give kids sweets. They don’t even ask if it’s ok. We even had sweets on a mums birthday too.
— MG (@MGphlox) March 11, 2019
However, not everyone is happy with Crawford-Usher’s anti-sweets stance.
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Tom Bosworth, an Olympic race walker, argued she should “let a child be a child”, while another Pink Floyd in calling to “leave them kids alone”.
This head teacher is a moron. Again, common sense needs to be used here. Really what is happening to society to ban kids from having sweets on their birthday. – ban them every other day if you like, but let a child be a child on their birthday though! https://t.co/P4vCDBMMiD
— Tom Bosworth (@TomBosworth) March 11, 2019
Ok, let’s ban sweets but only after chocolate biscuits tea coffee cigarettes and cakes etc are banned from the staff room and replaced with fruit juice & carrot sticks. Let’s have teachers competing in sports day too! You know lead by example.
# Leave them kids alone! FFS😎 pic.twitter.com/OdVsecseuH— Steve Gothen (@stevo3210) March 12, 2019
Crawford-Usher’s school isn’t the only one trying to police what pupils do and do not eat.
Earlier this year, a parent took to Mumsnet to describe how she was called in for a special meeting for including a mini chocolate bar in a packed meal.