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important allergy update from Bernabi
Published on Dec 2, 2019 07:15
Monday, December 2, 2019
Greetings and happy December! As you know, one of Bernabi’s greatest priorities over the last two years has been supporting our understanding and response to food allergies within our school. Our committee, which consists of parents, faculty, staff, nurses and administration, met again last week to continue to evaluate areas for improvement, and we identified handwashing as a simple, but important focal point.
While we expect that students and adults both wash their hands throughout each day, we are looking to increase attention to this important step, and establish a procedure for all students to wash their hands with soap after eating; whether it be snack or lunch. As you know, cross contamination is an important safety consideration when it comes to food allergies, and so this procedure will need to take place upon entry into the classroom after lunch/snack.
If and when coordinating 20 or more students to wash their hands with soap is not practical, we want teachers to know that baby wipes are an acceptable alternative, but that hand sanitizer does not replace washing/wiping as it does not remove the food proteins that cause reactions. Our leadership team will evaluate the need heading into next year and with respect to our supply list, but in the meantime, I am looking for donations of unscented baby wipes to distribute across all settings at Bernabi! If you’re willing to support us in this initiative, please send any unscented baby wipes in with your child—thank you!
As always, thank you for your ongoing support of our collaborative work at making Bernabi the greatest and safest place for all children to learn. Besides allergy awareness, I hope you will support our renewed focus on hand washing as we enter cold and flu season—it can only help everyone!
Sincerely,
David Caiazza
Principal
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