School telling us to remove nut trees from community orchard

[Calling]

We are in a local voluntary group and local people planted an orchard in the grounds of a school, for the school.

Now, the school has written to say that we have to remove the nut trees because one pupil has a bad nut allergy.

There are fruit and nut trees, that the local people planted some years ago and we have put a lot of work into weeding and watering. The yield was actually for the kids and we are volunteering with the school with and nature sessions outside.

Before anyone says we are potential child killers, we do understand the importance of safety. There is a management plan in place, but the school has been asked by a parent to remove our trees.
I do feel disheartened - nobody in the school said no to nut trees originally.

Why not, the school isn’t following current allergy advice.

Yeah.. it's such a hard one, isn't it? How do you say nicely to parents: that's a you problem.

Are they going to ask for all nuts to be removed from the whole planet? But then again.. it's the child's school and where they have to be all day, every day.

Not sure where I land on this. Think both sides have valid points.

This entirely sensible post is what people need to consider. Rather than rushing to nut free schools and cries of “are you a child killer” follow the facts.
The parents (on a rota - ha) can help put up a canopy when the tress fruit and explain as part of the community they are helping each other. Put some effort into doing something useful rather than rushing to simplistic conclusions.

No. The child should be banned from orchard.

I agree but after the kitchen staff saying they couldn’t guarantee there would be no cross contamination I decided it wasn’t worth the risk to push the issue.

@Calling Has the school said which nuts this child is allergic to? Or have they just said 'all nuts' to be on the safe side?

3% of children are allergic to dairy, 2 children have died in school in recent years due to a dairy allergy, over a quarter of all allergy deaths in children are due to dairy allergies, dairy allergy is the only allergy to have not seen a reduction in the rates of death whereas all other fatal allergies have halved their death rate in the last 10 years. Do you support all schools going dairy free or do you recognise that’s impossible and so the focus should be on being allergy aware and not creating a false sense of security with bans?

The school is doing what it feels it needs to do to keep children safe. Benedict’s Law sets minimum standards but the school can put more in place if they feel it’s necessary. They’re balancing safety have to ensure safety but also wellbeing. Parents of allergy kids have enough to worry about. Kids do the most ridiculous things that you wouldn’t even think of. One of the other kids coujd decide it’s fun to jump on the nuts, explode them and throw them around the playground. However unlikely, It’s not worth the risk. The trees can go.

No the staff should be allergy aware re all allergies and if a child has been flagged it should be on his/ her plan with said tree cordoned off at playtime or supervised by staff when children are outside. Any school that lets kids things throw items round the playground is not supervising playtime properly.

Are you aware Benedict’s law came about because Benedict died from cows milk allergy in school?

Can you imagine how his parents feel seeing his death used to justify nut bans in school but never a milk ban?

His parents don’t ask for a milk ban as it’s impossible but to use his death to try and ban a completely different allergen and in fact an allergen that dairy allergic children, like Benedict, rely on to meet their nutritional needs without dairy is insane.

I read that the tree isn’t an issue, the danger outdoors is if old, discarded nuts, shells, or sticky residue from the tree are lying on the ground and the child touches them and then touches their mouth or eyes.
Op with all the work the volunteers have put in to grow these beautiful trees it would be heartbreaking for a tree surgeon to hack them down. I think I would be tempted to find gardens for them. I would love someone to come and plant one in mine!
Going forward the school should list exactly what is and isn’t allowed but I bet they are just reacting and probably have no real interest in what is there.
It must be terrifying having a child with allergies but everything can’t be controlled. Surely better to educate the child on the dangers.
(Our school garden was planted by two long serving teachers and the librarian. There were walnut trees on the edge of the land- we used to break open the outer case to make our fingers brown. Also some shrub with white berries that would pop if you squeeze them - we would be told they are poisonous don’t touch! No idea if they were but nothing ever happened).

Exactly this!

It’s more than one tree and is next to the playground, presumably hanging over. It’s far essier and less risky to move the tree off site. Why wouldn’t the school do that? The tree doesn’t need to be there. They can’t do anything with the nuts in school as schools really should be but free. Have you been to a primary school lately? With the best will in the world, kids are unpredictable, staff budgets are beyond tight, playtimes are busy. Just move the tree.
Wild how precious some people are about accommodating children with life threatening allergies.

u volunteer, id just leave them to it tbh. parent shd probably find a safer school for her child.

Schools are not supposed to be nut free!🙄Did you even read the posts below?

A very good point, YasyingTheRainbow, but what I personally struggle with is how kids manage elsewhere if they're apparently in severe danger if so much as touched by someone else who's had nuts

Do they go out fully covered, masked and gloved at all other times, and if not what's so special about schools?

Who says schools aren’t ‘supposed’ to be nut free? Every school my children have gone to, my husband has worked at and I’ve been governor at gas been nut free. My children’s sports and activity groups are nut free. It’s more unusual these days for an organised children’s venue/school not to be nut free. What’s your issue with it?

I don’t think it’s because the tress are overhanging the playground

The school owns the orchard land and OP’s volunteer team holds nature lessons there. So it’s a bit more interactive than overhang

Can you not reach an agreement where you put a tight mesh net over and round it so that it catches all that falls from it and the net is then emptied on a regular basis?

OP said the trees are in reach of the playground. So there’s risk from both a spontaneous and organised POV. Just better to move the trees off site.

Schools have a very different reaction to a child with a severe nut allergy to a child with a severe milk allergy. If a child has a contact milk allergy where skin contact with milk can cause anaphylactic reaction they have to negotiate milk in the classroom during reception as the other children are entitled to milk which children can spill down themselves and exposure to milk products such as cheese and yogurt at lunchtime or spillages on other children's school uniform but a child with a similar or often much more mild nut allergy will mean nuts banned from the entire school.
As volunteers the school can't make you remove the trees but they can choose to do it themselves if they want them removed. On the way home from school we walked past walnut and hazelnut trees when mine were young (plus conkers, acorns and other non edible things)

I can only speak for my child who is cows milk protein allergic, she is anaphylactic if it’s ingested, she also reacts to contact but so far never an anaphylactic reaction to contact.

She has been taught from a young age to never eat or drink food that hasn’t come from home, our entire home is now dairy free. She is hyper aware of symptoms, she actually has other life threatening medical conditions including adrenal insufficiency so she is always aware of any sign of being unwell.

She carries an epi-pen and a hydrocortisone injection everywhere she goes. Ironically an allergic reaction can also put her into adrenal crisis so if she needed the epi-pen she would also need the hydrocortisone injection but sometimes she will just need the hydrocortisone injection.

She was practising injecting oranges from the age of 5 in case she ever needed to self administer, she never has so far. She wears a medical alert bracelet, has a medical alert on her phone lock screen and her seatbelt cover in the car with emergency instructions for any passer by to follow if needed.

It is hard and even more so now she’s in her teens as she’s out independently more but ultimately everything in life is a risk / benefit decision and it’s important that she is able to live her life as best she can so we hope we’ve given her the tools to help her to do this. She’s pretty good to be fair and when she got her first boyfriend she made him wash his hands before she would hold it which made me laugh. She also has a serious autoimmune disorder, the treatment for which means she is immunocompromised and so she’s hyper aware of good hygiene on top of everything else.

I would give anything for her to not have to deal with this and be hyper alert but ultimately that’s not possible, it’s the only way she stays alive. Deaths happen when people have a false sense of security and think something is safe when it’s not, we’ve taught her to never assume her safety. Her own home is the only place she can assume everything is safe for her.

Can you advise me how a nut free school allows the nutritional needs of a dairy allergic child to be met considering they rely on nut based dairy alternatives?

Can you advise why schools are supposed to be nut free and yet not dairy free when dairy allergy is responsible for more deaths in children each year than nut allergy?

Can you advise why the schools you are governor at are not following the advice given by the anaphylaxis trust, the allergy trust uk and Benedict’s law?

I feel so sad and disheartened for you, I am also a gardener and this would make my heart ache. Is it just the nut trees that have to go or all of them? I have to admit I’m surprised the school opted for anything nut as most schools are nut free places. if the school want it done then I think they need to pay and organise if you are unable which I imagine is the case. I am so sorry, all your hard work and endevours. Could someone carefully remove and replace somewhere else as I am very sure a local allotment Would jump at the chance to have these.
Some children are labelled as allergic because it is severe and / or airborne - or unknown possibility. Schools therefor have to be nut safe, then you go down the road to a supermarket and there could be a broken bag of nuts less than a metre from your child. My local fruit and veg shop and market stall have them out in the fresh air, I guess just schools have to be ok. I really hope you find them a new beloved home.

Well previous nuts will have fallen and rotted/ mixed with soil so technically any soil they touch could be contaminated. I'm guessing the school aren't going to ask you to remove all the soil and replace it with 'nut free soil' so it may be that their child doesn't go and accepts this as an unfortunate consequence of severe allergy.