Also a small school...

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Home : 2008 : April : 23

Also a small school...
By vespergirl

Bandmom, I am also at a small school. I think that when you are smaller, you can manage this in ways that sometimes -- for all of the right reasons, of course -- don't work on a large district or large school level.

In
our environment, thanks to the size, we are all very aware of who the allergic kids are. We are all Epi-pen trained and every parent of a child with allergies has provided the school with several Epi-pens. We keep a supply of them in the cafeteria, one in the child's classroom, and one in the office. Because they are prescription items, we like to keep one specifically for each

child at least in the cafeteria and classroom. We're a small campus so we can easily run to wherever the pen is stored.

We do not have a peanut-free table nor are we a nut-free school. However, we also do not allow homebaked treats for the very issue of ingredient and preparation control. I believe that presently, most of our allergic kids aren't that severely allergic. However, I think that if one were extremely allergic, we would have that child eat in the office with a friend(s).

I think I agree that isolating the kids at a peanut-free table can be hard, but I also think -- from what friends of kids with allergies have told me -- they learn to deal with this as a fact of their lives, just as others learn to deal with eyeglasses or dyslexia or celiac disease or any other lifelong condition.

I didn't think it could get much worse than a nut allergy, but I recently learned that one my neighbors has a kindergartener who is literally allergic to everything but rice, potatoes, and a few other very bland carbohydrates. He lives on those items and infant formula. Can you imagine a world without chocolate ... sour cream and onion potato chips ... Thanksgiving dinner ... birthday cake. Peanut allergies and a separate table don't seem quite as bad when I think about this little guy.