Dinner school
March 28th 2026
This term makes a relatively late appearance in the Dictionaries of the Scots Language (DSL) where it is defined as, “the place where school lunches are served”.
The earliest example currently in DSL comes from James Kelman’s Greyhound for Breakfast (1988): “Gary! I’ve told you umpteen times, you can go to the bloody dinner-school whenever you like. I don’t want to go to the dinner-school”.
Mary McCabe’s Everwinding Times (1994) offers a more positive portrayal: “She now looked forward excitedly to lunchtime, for Barry also attended dinner-school”.
Although DSL links the term to Glasgow, additional research has revealed wider usage. In February 1948, the Courier featured a gripe from one frustrated teacher: “As a councillor and member, I believe, of Angus Education Committee, she should know that attendance at ‘dinner-school’ is not part of a teacher’s duty!”.
The following comes from the Dufftown News and Speyside Advertiser in May 1954: “With teachers doing all sorts of strange tasks for their pupils’ welfare, we have some sympathy for the supervisor of the dinner school”.
When looking for more recent evidence, we find that there are still some people who look back fondly on their experience eating at dinner school, as this example from the Glasgow Times in April 2020 shows: “My brothers and I all went to dinner school, as that was our main meal of the day. The dinner tickets were punched every day with a wee machine. We never complained about the dinners, it was just the norm”.
Dictionaries of the Scots Language would like to thank Bob Dewar for illustrating our Scots Word of the Week feature.
