Talking Allergies

I am sorry for not replying earlier, I just read your post. I was away from this forum for a while. I just hit that point where I am too tired to even talk about it. So for now I accepted things the way they are. Nothing changed at school, supervision problem is still there. I dedicated myself to go to school every single day for snack time and I bring my daughter home for lunch. I also am stay-at-home mom . I do not know for how long will I be doing this or is this ever going to change. I am so afraid that one day accident will happen but until then school will keep this routine. Since I'm there every single day I can see that it is possible to have teachers in a classroom, it would just take some reorganization and some compassion. This is it for now. I can not even talk to principal any more,last time a broke down in tears in her office. They just do not get it. School has this "healthy snack "program and one day they served a salad dressing with egg and soy in it. I could not believe nobody checked the label. I asked them not to take it my daughter's classroom. Other mom's were so upset, it took me 5 minutes of explaining why is this not safe. ( one of them even said " it is only one child ") Later that week principal and vice-principal called me to office about this issue. Apparently some other moms/volunteers complained that kids in my daughter class are not eating there vegetables because they don't have their salad dressing. It was very upsetting, I was just so heartbroken how much they don't understand and don't care. That episode hit me really hard, I was just so disappointed. I'm sorry, this is such a long post, and not positive at all. Yes, we need to something about this, and very soon.
All the best
Sofia

Sofia, I am so sorry you are going through this. I feel it is very unprofessional of the school to be coming to you with the complaints of other parents. They should not be putting this burden on you; it is their responsability to explain and enforce . Did you contact the College of Teachers ( www.oct.ca) and ask about student supervision and teacher liability?

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daughter: 6 years tree nuts, peanuts

Why on earth would they be giving kids something messy like salad dressing? How old are these students?

I'm pretty sure kids would dip their carrots in apple sauce or hummus if given the opportunity.

I hate the "it's only one child" line. How many children does it take to make it important? Do they realize how petty they sound when they say that? My all time non-favourite line? "Well, no one died." I reply, "Yet."

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Moderator
Daughter: asthma, allergies to egg, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, most legumes (not soy) & penicillin. Developing hayfever type allergies.
Husband: no allergies
Me: allergies to some tree that flowers in May
Cat: allergic to beef, pork and lamb

Yes, I wonder the same thing. I even said that kids should not be served salad dressing in a fist place. They are 6 years old, and we are suppose to teach them about healthy eating ...What bugged me also is the idea of
" What would happened if I was not there? " ...I am leaving my child with these people every day and I do not have trust in them at all.....
Thank you for listening and your advice!

Sofia, you have Sabrina's Law on your side so...can you ask the principal to explain to you what the school is doing to reduce exposure to the allergen?
I find that by asking them what they have planned, I can breathe a little and try to remain calm. Then I can counter with my concerns as to what is not being addressed.
They don't always have as clear a picture as we do because they don't live this 24/7. By asking for them to clairify their plans you give them the opportunity to show you that they do understand and are following the law. It shows how you are working with them and allows for dialogue.
I have been to parties in allergen aware establishments where children where not allowed to leave the table until they washed their hands with a moist towelette. Is there a salad dressing that you use which is safe?
Just a few thoughts.

_________________
Moderator
Daughter: asthma, allergies to egg, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, most legumes (not soy) & penicillin. Developing hayfever type allergies.
Husband: no allergies
Me: allergies to some tree that flowers in May
Cat: allergic to beef, pork and lamb

Have a look over this article and it may be able to help out with wording to your principal. I will be facing this problem soon, and am already going to bring it up at parent council this year.
http://www.oct.ca/publications/professi ... 8/duty.htm
What I find fascinating, is that teachers are not to leave children unsupervised at any point during the day (i.e. they can't just leave the classroom to go to the bathroom freely), yet we allow a large number of children to be left alone for an extended period of time and then throw food into the mix! I just don't get it.

Ang

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6 1/2 year old son - anaphylactic to tree nuts, allergic to dust and moulds
5 1/2 year old son - no allergies
15 month old son...allergies unknown

About the supervision issue---I'm pretty sure that there would be major liability issues with not providing proper supervision at lunch or any other time during the school day!

Sorry to hear about how insensitive the school is being on all fronts.

The thing is our school is not the only one with this procedure. Many schools in our region have the same issue. I quess that it why this is kind of normal for our principal. I agree with you Susan than they just can not get it, they do not live with it and I accept this.
I took Halton district Anaphylactic Protocol with me to the Principal's office and highlighted on a few pages about "establishing safe eating area procedures / providing vigilant supervision in eating areas with Ana. students." But it all comes to not having enough recourses and collective agreement :
The
Board must "ensure that no teacher is required to perform in excess of one
hundred (100)
minutes of supervision time" and "make every reasonable effort to ensure
that no teacher
is required to perform in excess of eighty (80) minutes" in a "five (5) day
instructional
week." These obligations are qualified by the following phrase: "provided
that student
safety is protected and subject to there being no additional cost to the
Board."

She keeps telling me that they are very vigilant and not to worry. This Principal grow up with a cousin who has severe food allergies. She keeps telling me that if her cousin "Jill" was ok 30 years ago when people were not allergy aware at all , my daughter will be just fine in today's world.

I was wondering what is the situation in other schools and boards. How do they supervise students during eating time.

Personally, I feel that my girls are MY girls and it is my responsibility as their mother to NOT leave them anywhere I do not feel they are safe. I mean, how would I feel if something happened, I knew the situation was unsafe and I had left them anyways? Honestly, I'd never forgive myself. If a school situation is not safe, and the people in charge just don't get it...you don't have to hand over your child.

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DD age 9 1/2 -peanuts, nuts,
DD age 7 1/2 - milk, eggs, chicken, peanuts, treenuts, cats, dogs,
DS age 2 1/2
Husband- asthma, eggs, treenuts, fish, shellfish environmental
Self - penicillan, eurithromiacin, mild laytex allergy.

You are right saskmommyof2 , I would never forgive myself either.
But she needs to go to school. She has right to go to school.
We do not have money for private school and I can not home-school her.

I almost forgot the salad dressing issue:
I offered to buy a safe one, which I was unsuccessfully looking for around a few grocery stores. (they either have Soya oil or egg). Then I offered to get a cheese or sour cream, which they accepted. There is a squeezable sour cream ( I was so happy to find it) by Our Compliments. So we settled this for now.

We're in Manitoba, not Ontario and our sons (Grade 2) have snack time in each of their classrooms supervised by their teachers. My sons come home for lunch, but at school they hire lunch supervisors (who are trained for anaphylaxis), and my understanding is that they have one supervisor per classroom in the early grades. Letters are also sent home asking students in the class of an anapylactic child to refrain from sending in the child's allergens for snack, lunch or celebrations, and each classroom is cleaned after lunch (desks wiped down etc.). I feel happy and confident with this system.

Our old school in Alberta was much less allergy friendly. Children were expected to eat snack on the playground during recess, with a handful of adults keeping watch over the whole school. It was really unsafe. We were trying to work with the school to get changes made, but it was a slow, frustrating process. The school admin. were trying to be cooperative, but we were asking for lot of changes, and they didn't seem to get how unsafe it was. They were resistant to the idea of asking parents in the community to cooperate with any food restrictions (afraid of a backlash), so decided to have all of the children in my sons' grade eat their lunch in the gym to cut down on potential cross contamination in the classroom, which seemed like lot more trouble to me than simply asking for some community cooperation! We were negotiating the recess/snack time thing with them when we found out we would be moving anyway.

I was really surprised at how good our current school is for allergies, the school in AB was giving us the attitude that the changes we were asking for were too much trouble, couldn't be done, unheard of and/or unreasonable and here we have a school district that goes above and beyond anything we had asked for, and is a safe, inclusive place for kids with allergies. I actually sent our old principal links to the new school district's anaphylaxis policies.

I'm sorry to hear about the frustrating cavalier attitude from your principal, and the lousy, unsafe procedures your school has. It can be done differently.

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1 son allergic to eggs, peanuts, green peas, chick peas, lentils and tomatoes
(avoiding tree nuts and most other legumes too)
1 son allergic to eggs, and has outgrown peanuts
Both with many environmental allergies, asthma and eczema

Thank you twinmom for taking your time and answering my question about your school. I need to have some reference , I need to know how others are doing, since I am planning to fight this.
It is wonderful what they do in your school. I am happy for you and your boys.
Wow, teachers stay with kids for snack. Fantastic!
In our school they hire lunch supervisors but ONLY for kindergartens. Lunch procedure is same, one teacher walking down the hallways monitoring 7 classrooms.
All the best
Sofia

Hello,

My children are in the French Catholic system in Ottawa which has full day jk and sk. The JK and SK have an adult supervisor in class during lunch. Depending on the school, in grade 1-6, a supervisor might do 2 classes or so but a couple of older kids are there too. I was nervous when my now 9 year old son started school. Even though I was pregnant, I became a lunch supervisor in another class (as to not breathe down his neck but so I could be close by). I was comfortable with the situation. Actually because our school has two floors, the grade 1 class (which is on the ground floor) also has a supervisor and on the second floor in a grade 2 class, there is a child with a dairy allergy, so our principal made a request to the school board and actually got funds for a sole supervisor for that class (that usually doesn't happen). The principal actually supervises a couple of classes herself on the second floor (nobody wants to do the grade 6 class

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Jacqueline Labossière-Jager
Stittsville, ON

son - born 1998, allergy to peanut, nuts, sesame, shellfish and kiwi; a bunch of allergies to plants, animals, etc. and asthma
daughter - born 2003, no known allergies

Wow, good for your principal to get that funding!

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Moderator
Daughter: asthma, allergies to egg, milk, peanuts, tree nuts, most legumes (not soy) & penicillin. Developing hayfever type allergies.
Husband: no allergies
Me: allergies to some tree that flowers in May
Cat: allergic to beef, pork and lamb