The Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine has released the first results of the nationwide school meal survey conducted by the State Service of Education Quality. According to the ministry, 2,162 questionnaires had been processed by the time of analysis, and overall the majority of respondents rated school meals positively. At the same time, as the Ministry of Education emphasizes, feedback from parents is needed above all to identify specific problems on the ground: the ministry, together with the regions and the State Service of Food and Consumer Protection, is already working on the issues raised by survey participants. The final results and more detailed statistics will be published on the ministry's official website.
Menu variety and the taste of dishes — the main complaint
The key dissatisfaction recorded in the results is not about children not eating, but about quality and variety. According to data cited by Ukrainian media outlets referencing the survey, nearly 40% of parents express dissatisfaction with the variety of the school menu. Respondents most often point to two aspects: the monotony of the dishes and their insufficient taste. It is precisely these two points that, in essence, form the main demand of school meal operators — to make the diet more varied and at the same time appetizing, not just filling.
Meals during prolonged air raids
The Ministry of Education devotes a separate block of attention to organizing meals under wartime conditions. The ministry notes that there is a need to better organize and, equally importantly, to explain to parents the procedure for feeding children during prolonged air raids. This is a matter of transparency: parents should understand how and what students are fed when the school switches to operating in shelters or when classes are cancelled or shortened. In essence, this is a question of trust between the school and the family in a situation where children spend a lot of time in the institution.
Context: free lunches and updated standards
The survey was conducted against the backdrop of significant changes in the school meal system. From 1 September 2026, school meals in Ukraine became free: all students, regardless of region or grade, are entitled to a hot lunch. In parallel, the country updated the nutritional standards in schools and kindergartens — lunch is recommended to start earlier, the portion of vegetables and the number of cereal dishes should be increased, and a special menu for children with medical indications is also permitted, including lactose-free and plant-based products. Thus, the survey results can be viewed as the first "unfolding" of feedback already after the launch of free and standards-updated meals.
Contradictory data
It is important here to honestly note the limits of interpretation. First, the survey is voluntary and will run until 16 October 2026, so the current figures reflect the opinions of parents who have already participated and are not representative of the entire Ukrainian education system. In other words, the conclusion that "the majority are satisfied" so far describes only the active part of respondents, not the entire parent population. Second, the initial reports contain a discrepancy in the name of the surveying body: some formulations use the abbreviation DSYO, others — DSKO, which may be misleading about the exact source. Finally, the overall positive assessment and the nearly 40% level of dissatisfaction with menu variety do not contradict each other: these are different dimensions — overall satisfaction and a specific complaint about the assortment. Until the survey closes and the full statistics are published on the Ministry of Education's website, all current figures should be treated as preliminary.
Parents who have remarks about the organization of student meals can contact the territorial office of the education quality service in their region. The full survey results and extended analytics based on them will be published on the official website of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine.
