By Sabrina Cardin
Staff writer
September 21, 2008 11:41 pm AMESBURY — With plenty of experience adjusting to individual food allergies, Amesbury schools are taking a unique approach to making all students feel comfortable in the lunch room. Following a policy already tested at Amesbury Middle School, a new policy at Amesbury Elementary School calls for students consuming anything with nut products to sit at two designated tables. Children with peanut allergies are welcome to sit anywhere else. "We wanted to take the focus off the child and on to the product," Amesbury Elementary School Principal Walter Helliesen said. In the past students with peanut and tree nut allergies were designated to two tables in the lunch room. Due to the severity of the allergy and the common place nuts have in children's food, the schools see the strategy as a proactive way to monitor the safety of students with allergies. "Like any change, the best way to cope with change is to help create it," said Joan Schleeweis-Connor, Nurse Leader for Amesbury Public Schools. Schleeweis-Connor said that the new arrangement also helps cut down on cleaning time. Last year with the two designated peanut-free tables, all other tables had to be thoroughly cleansed to ensure no cross-contamination. With the change the only tables that need to be meticulously cleansed are the two tables allowing peanuts. "This is not a policy change, but a philosophy change," Helliesen said. As of last year, at Amesbury schools there were nine children with bee allergies, 34 with food allergies, four with latex allergy and 150 children with asthma across the district. AES alone had nine children with epi-pens. Like many schools in the region, increasing awareness of students' allergies has led to many policy changes over recent years, most of which involve the regulation of nut products entering the school. Some schools have gone as far as to ban nut products from entering the school doors. In Amesbury, programs have included monitoring where students sit at lunch and taking nut products off the lunch menu. Under the new program, each lunch period will have two monitors and one administrator in charge of observing the students, monitoring that children are sitting at correct tables and that no nut products have left the specific tables. Currently the Amesbury School District is defined as a "nut-sensitive" district. Although nut products are allowed in the school, certain common areas and classrooms are defined as nut-free zones. Teachers are also now required to participate in a Life Threatening Allergies program and yearly epi-pen training. "You want to protect kids with the issues," Schleewies-Connor said. "You have to take care of them." BOX Allergies in Amesbury Kids with allergies in Amesbury schools as of June, 2008: 9 with beesting allergies 34 with food allergies 4 with latex allergies 150 with asthma 47 epi-pens Source: Amesbury School District
—
Copyright © 1999-2010 cnhi, inc.