Canada

Even eating at school wasn't a thing for us—when I was in elementary school, only the kids being bussed in (a tiny minority) didn't go home for lunch.

Disappointed but can confirm. There was never a single food fight during my entire K - 12 education. It was massively disappointing.

I was led to belive food fights would be a bi weekly occurrence by our media overlords. They lied.

Same here growing up in a small west coast town. There was rarely even a cafeteria that served hot meals until high school and it wasn't much as it was run by students for economics/business class. They also managed a small store that sold junk food and pop.

I did go to high school in Calgary for a bit but I was mostly in shock by the full time RCMP office in the school and the diversity of students beyond the mostly First Nations and Caucasians I grew up with so the lunch situation wasn't really something I recall.

I suspect much has changed since then as this was in the early 90s.

I recall leaving school to go to local fast food joints or the convenience store for something to eat as far back as junior high. I've seen plenty of this with local convenience stores near schools too.

Recently I was in Cranbrook BC and stopped at a Safeway around lunchtime. I was floored at how many students were there getting lunch. It seemed like it was a big deal for the store as I hadn't seen such a large deli and sandwich areas in big city Safeways. The high school was across the street so perhaps it acts as a cafeteria in this case.

I'm curious how public food programs are delivered in schools.

As a Canadian, it's entirely out of my experience.

Hopefully it's only because your family was financially secure, and you didn't even notice the kids that needed these lunches getting these lunches. Being able to feed them without making them feel bad about it is awesome.

I can see 3 fresh food delivery trucks infront of a Montréal daycare/K-6 unloading right now. And there will be another 2-5 trucks tomorrow