Abstract
This Briefing considers preliminary evaluation work on Ka Ora, Ka Ako, the free, healthy school lunch programme. It finds that this programme is currently performing very well against 21 stakeholder-determined criteria. The major improvements identified are getting secure, ongoing funding for the programme; identifying ways to expand the programme so that all children in Aotearoa New Zealand will benefit; undertaking a formal cost-effectiveness study; and building in more environmental sustainability. Value for Investment is a mixed-methods, participatory system that assesses how well resources are used and how much value is created. 1 We gathered inputs from community and government stakeholders to identify what value they expect the programme to produce. From this value proposition, we created 21 criteria in five economic domains to measure those values and validated them with stakeholders. Next, we collected Ka Ora, Ka Ako evaluations and monitoring data to create an evidence base for each criterion. Programme performance (excellent, good, adequate, poor) for each criterion was made by the research team but has yet to be validated by stakeholders. We present these preliminary assessments with more details available in the attached summary report and