If I had to choose just one word to describe my friend Jane Goodman, it would be ‘generous’. If you gave me two words to describe her instead of one, I would go for ‘extremely generous’.

Jane Goodman lived and worked in Islington. She was a paediatric dental specialist. She loved working with children and had an amazing rapport with them, and quickly put them at ease at the Eastman Dental Hospital. But she did so much more than that both at work and outside. She loved life and particularly enjoyed strong friendships with people from all walks of life. Her favourite way of socialising was round a table enjoying a wide range of food.  And this generosity has continued after her death with the work of The Jane Goodman Trust established as her legacy.

The Trustees of TastEd recently learned that The Jane Goodman Trust had made a £100,000 donation to support our mission to give as many children as possible the chance to experience the joy of fresh vegetables and fruits. This grant will be nothing short of life-changing for us as a small and young charity. Again, the words that spring to mind are ‘extremely generous’.

This donation will help us to support the rollout of the TastEd programme in schools and early years settings across the whole borough of Islington. Hundreds of children in dozens of schools and nurseries will benefit from this.

Remembering her natural generosity and her vocation for improving child health, I’m confident Jane would have been so pleased that the donation from her trust will be used to help as many children as possible to experience the joy of talking about food, food preferences and memories. She would also have appreciated the inclusive nature of TastEd lessons. As with Jane’s dinner table, the TastEd classroom is a welcoming place. The pleasures of sharing, tasting, expressing delight (or disgust), bringing their own stories will reach many more children thanks to this donation. She would also be pleased that we focus on fresh vegetables and fruit and having fun.

The benefits of this donation to TastEd will stretch far beyond Islington. We are rapidly expanding and are now in over 170 schools and nurseries. The donation will help us to provide support to schools, providing some vegetables and fruit, resources and increasing the staff at TastEd to help us keep pace with our rapid expansion to more schools across the UK. Thank you to Jane for being so generous and to the trustees of The Jane Goodman Trust who have the confidence in us to use her donation wisely. Generous. Extremely generous.

Trustee Jane Lockie writes about a £100,000 donation from The Jane Goodman Trust