Who Is Back At School and How is it Going?

I'm back since Aug 27th! It's going great, I'm at a new school district, enjoying a brand new clinic, the school is about 2 years old. I'm learning new people, new procedures and better pay. We're putting health conditions in as well as immunizations. My nurse assist was already there and is wonderful to work with. I left 7-8th graders, and now have 9th graders. It's going great!

We started last week and the kids started yesterday. I just started a new job at the high school so it's lots of learning for me!! Going pretty well so far. Just keep an eye out for my posts when I have questions!!

Hi all! One thing that has been dominant at the beginning of this year is policy-making regarding peanut allergies. Our elementary schools are having children wash hands when arriving at school, before and after lunch. A peanut-free section of a lunch table and bench is wiped down before the affected students sit to eat, and other students' lunches are checked to see if they may sit at the peanut-free table each day. Only peanut-free treats may be distributed in those particular classrooms where students have peanut allergies. One mom transferring in said that their previous elementary school is totally peanut-free. Are any of you familiar with a policy like this or how it may be brought about? Are we infringing on other students' rights to go totally peanut-free??!! Thanks and have a great year!

One thing we pointed out to parents when I worked at elementary schools is that it is impossible to go "peanut free" . By saying that, you are instilling a false sense of security, because we never can possible know who had peanut butter for breakfast and has residual on their hands or what exactly is packed in lunch boxes. Also we had a student with SEVERE egg allergies. If we had to guarantee peanut free would we have to guarantee egg free, gluten free, soy free, milk free....you get the idea. We had a peanut free table and the kids had to wash their hands after lunch and with one child who was severely allergic, the nurse or other trained person actually took the epi-pen to the cafeteria while she ate (never needed it)

If you haven't yet, check out the Food Allergy and Anaphalyxis Network website. They have a free toolkit they'll send you and lots of good resources.