32 million U.

S.

citizens had an allergy of some sort, and of those, of that total number there's 5.

6 million children that have that.

So if you think about it, it's one in 13 kiddos.

If you want to get a little bit more personal, that's also about two,

about two kiddos in every classroom.

Welcome, Tara.

How are you doing today?

Good.

How are you in the U.

S.?

You know what?

It's been a heck of a week, but I am happy to be here with you to talk

about a really interesting topic that I'm excited to chat with you on.

Cause I know and understand that you are the go to expert in

the allergen awareness fields.

And correct me if I'm wrong, but I know that you do a lot of work with

the peanut council and peanut board.

I'd love to hear a little bit about that and please feel free to share a little

bit about your background and some of the different amazing accomplishments that

you've had in the world of allergens.

Yeah, thank you so much.

Yeah, so I've I'm a dietitian with over a decade of experience

specifically in school nutrition.

So I've worked at the state level.

So those of you that have had an audit recently, I have been that

person that walks in the front door and you don't like seeing their face.

But all in that same, I know what that looks like.

On the same realm I've done training for the statewide side as well.

And then I worked at several local school districts being their

dietician, helping managing the whole operation of a school food service.

So I've seen a lot of different things.

And now I've, I work with nonprofits and industry side almost.

So I've seen about every angle you can think of in terms of school nutrition.

And with those experiences, I've also been able to see a ton

of different size of schools.

So we're talking about a 2, 500 student enrollment all the way up to 20, 000.

So a big range a lot of different, cafeterias where they operate things.

So that's always important to take into consideration, right?

When we do an allergy management plan.

So I enjoy it.

I enjoy seeing schools and getting to know people and how they're

handling these types of things and helping to accommodate their kiddos.

That's really awesome.

And then I, you have a consulting company now, and do you assist

school districts with developing that type of an allergy management plan?

Yes.

Yes.

So now I do have my own company and I've seen just from when I was at a

school district as a dietician, that the amount of time that I spent helping

our program run well and efficiently and effectively for our kiddos,

especially those that have, a dietary need or accommodation to be made.

There's just a lot to it.

And when I was thinking about what do I want to help people with the most?

I thought this would be a good space having been in that position.

So I know how it feels to be overwhelmed.

You're wanting to help these parents and these students, but also like

how do you juggle everything?

So yes, so I do provide services of just like trainings it's, Back to

school training, like we're in the season right now, but I also do provide

the service of coming in and just like taking that off of the service

director's hands or minds trying to help them focus on those big goals.

They always have these big goals of helping more kiddos

reaching more students.

Elevating their program.

So I just want to come alongside them and help them reach the goals that they have.

Yeah.

Speaking of goals, what are some, kind of things that you're working on?

Some maybe passion projects or some big goals that you have

for this upcoming school year?

Yeah.

So this upcoming school year is packed with a lot of things.

I think the first one comes from what you mentioned earlier.

I do work with the national peanut board and the end of this year, Year

early next year, we'll be revealing a brand new breakfast toolkit that

involves a the final rules, the new final rules, as well as school

breakfast champions across the country.

So I have tons of new recipes and tips and tricks on how to.

Engage those secondary students.

So we're talking about middle and high school.

And I'm sure Wes, you've seen this too, but in my experience, there's

just not a lot of free resources out there that target that demographic.

It's easier if you will, to come up with graphic designs.

I'm sure you're familiar with that in terms of the little kiddos but we're

trying to reach those secondary kiddos where breakfast starts to be uncool.

Yeah, absolutely.

I feel like everyone these days is like a Canva warrior, everyone's on

their, trying to do their own graphic designs and create their own posters.

But you're right, there's not really a centralized resource that is

easily accessible to a lot of folks.

And it sounds like that's what you're really working on

creating for school districts.

Yes, exactly.

Like a turnkey toolkit.

We've even done Like you said, talk about Canva.

We've even created, we have a graphic designer, like hand draw

social media elements or images that you could add to your menu.

They're really sweet looking.

I'm excited about it.

It has a nice 80, like that neon sign that you have behind you feel.

So that's really cool.

So where can districts go to find these resources that you

guys are putting together?

Yeah.

The website will become live.

Like I said, the end of the school, the calendar year, you can sign up for it

now at the national peanut board to be.

On the first list, if you will but if you go to the national

peanut board, just Google it.

And then you'll want to search for resources within the top section

of their websites as schools.

And it'll take you there to that section.

Okay.

Awesome.

We'll put a link to it in the the bio for the show.

And that way people can just click on it and jump right over there.

Once it becomes live or they can sign up, like you said for some kind of

reminders when it does become available.

Yes.

Exactly.

Yeah, that's perfect.

Thank you.

I like asking this fun question before we dive into it, and obviously I wanna

jump into, talking about allergens.

But I'm, so just a little backstory on me.

When I was in college, the way that I paid the bills when I was going to

the University of Arizona studying business was that I actually DJ.

Fun fact, not many people know that about me.

So I am still a big movie or excuse me, a big song buff.

I listened to a lot of music, very eclectic taste.

And I love to ask people if you could pick a song to summarize your life, your

career what would that song be for you?

What's your theme song?

Yeah, and I've been thinking about that.

It's hard to pick one.

I don't know how people pick one.

But so I've been thinking about it.

And the first two that come to my mind, one's going to be old school.

I'm sure you would think of that.

I don't see going and DJing this song, but would be it is well, the old him

that is one that's always been there.

Like my, very young as childhood to have, I have tons of good memories with that

song, but it does seem like a a lifestyle.

Style thing of just being content in the certain circumstances you have or in

but the fun one that you will like more is hopefully I would love to hear your

musicality thoughts on this song is Mr.

Blue Sky by ELO.

I love that song.

There's so many cool elements to it, but I also love it.

There's just a lot of good memories of my husband and I, being outside when

it's nice, the windows down and the songs about enjoying the day where you're at,

those are the top two that I can focus on.

That's awesome.

I love ELO.

I was a big ELO.

I was like one of those weird kids that like really loved like old classic

rock when I was growing up and an ELO was like on the top of the list.

Like I had that their album on repeat and yeah, it was like ELO and Rush and

like all those like really good Led Zeppelin yeah, those were my jams, but I

definitely approve of those music choices.

Thank you.

Yeah.

My, my husband loves all of that.

So we're actually going to an ELO concert for his birthday this fall.

So it's like their last tour.

So we're really excited about that experience.

So that's amazing.

Yeah.

So really cool.

Thanks for sharing that with me.

I, like I said, it's just a fun question.

I I think helps with letting people know a different side of you.

And plus I love music, so I love hearing what people's kind of

music choices are like these days.

Since we're talking about allergens I'd love to kick things off today because I

think back and when I think of allergens, I look at, my childhood and when I

was going through the school system.

Yeah.

And I just do not remember allergens being something that anyone really talked about.

And if it was like a small group of people, it wasn't.

as prevalent as it is these days.

And it just seems like there are so many people, kids specifically coming

into the school system with all of these different ranges of allergens.

And there's, it's not just like peanut allergies or, allergies

to soy or the common ones.

It's like people have got a lot of different allergies these days.

And I'm curious, am I wrong in thinking that allergens have been a kind of this

growing thing in, the school districts?

No, you're not wrong.

They are growing allergies and not just, like you said, like

one or two different allergens.

We're talking about one student with all nine in their diet.

Like they're having to find foods that have all nine allergens.

And just so we're all on the same page the big nine are dairy, egg, soy.

Sesame, fish, shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts.

Did I say I had said soy?

I'm forgetting the last one.

There's one more.

That's bad.

Wheat.

I don't think I said wheat or gluten.

So those, yeah.

So those are the top ones that FDA is.

Identified as having most people in our country having some kind of reaction

to those nine and that's why they're added on There's a ton of foods out

there that do have allergy or an allergic response But those are the

biggest ones and that's why they're identified and those are the allergens

that people food service establishments need to accommodate people for and so

I was like digging through some data to help in terms of is this a big deal?

And the most recent study that I have is from 2018.

And the important thing that we could talk about here in a second is that this

study looked at adult reported allergies.

So that does make a big difference, right?

So we're not talking about a doctor reporting them, but these

are like self reported allergens.

And so in.

A little bit before 2018, they found that 32 million U.

S.

citizens had an allergy of some sort.

And of those of that total number there's 5.

6 million children that have that.

So if you think about it, it's one in 13 kiddos.

If you want to get a little bit more personal, that's also about two,

about two kiddos in every classroom.

So that's a lot of students and that's just from 2018.

That's the most recent that they've done that.

And I.

I've seen more and more that these research groups are also more interested

in adult prevalence of allergens.

It seems and I'm one of these people, it seems that more and more too, adults

are getting this like onset of an allergy and that's unique and rare.

And so they're really digging deep into that in terms of like new

studies to keep an eye out for.

So yeah, that's the prevalence of it.

I see it too, just in the past.

Over the past 10 years, I've seen this grow in terms of complexity

and and really specific too.

So I see more and more that kiddos may be able to consume an item

that has egg baked into it, whereas they can't have a whole egg.

So that's very unique and it requires a food service establishment to be able to

handle those unique and specific needs.

Thanks.

So when you say, adult onset to allergies, are you saying that people

went through their childhood without, any like known allergies and then

developed allergies as an adult?

Yes, I am one of those people.

I'm part of the statistic.

Yeah, so my whole childhood, I was fine in terms of all of the

food group, the foods that I mentioned about potential allergens.

But two years ago, I had a there's different ways that you can be diagnosed

as an allergy having an allergy to a food.

One is like a skin prick where they do like a graph on your form

and they prick it with all of the proteins from that food item.

Or a blood test.

So they take their blood and then they do the same thing with a protein,

but it's just in a petri dish.

So I had my blood taken and they found that I had and I have a very sensitive

reaction to gluten and wheat so much that I celiac test to see if I was celiac,

which I didn't have that right at all in my childhood, young adult life.

Like it's just it's new.

It's interesting.

Why?

So it's interesting because, I in my immediate family, I don't have anyone

that has any food allergies, but my wife, I will tell you, she is allergic to, I

joke that she's allergic to the outdoors because it seems like everything, it just

it throws her, her allergy reaction off.

And if the wind kicks up or if we go, like we went camping not long

ago to take kids out and when we were in the woods, she was just.

She could barely breathe.

She was so stopped up and she's had, the full panels where they like prick her

back, like all these different times.

Yeah.

And I don't know enough about all of that.

That, that's the closest that I've come to allergies.

And so for a lot of people, I feel like.

If they don't have that immediate connection where either they themselves

are one of those people that have an allergy or they have someone in their

family that have allergies, they might not know how to help, how severe some of

these allergies can really be for people.

I talked to me a little bit about if someone does have an

allergy to say peanuts and that individual has a severe reaction.

What are some of the potential consequences?

And what does that look like for someone?

Yeah.

And these are big questions, especially for you have a food

service establishment that has, this is their only business, right there.

It's a family business.

It means a lot all the way to a school district that has all of these

concerns that they have to take care of these children, which are legitimate.

And, we should be careful about it.

So there are several different types of reactions.

I'll start with the one you mentioned.

The most severe is called anaphylactic shock or anaphylaxis.

You'll hear it different ways.

But that is the most severe reaction that you could have.

And that's where, if you've heard of an EpiPen or epinephrine pen,

that's where you need that that kind of assistance to help these people,

these students out of the response.

And so what happens just generally is with an allergy reaction or response

is essentially your body, your immune system noticing those proteins.

Think of like the soy protein, every item has this protein in it.

I don't want to get too scientific and be boring.

But your body notices this protein in ingested in your

body and it starts to attack it.

So if you think about like poison Ivy, when you step on that poison

Ivy your skin's next to it, you automatically see this like rash.

If you're allergic to it.

And that's your body immediately reacting, trying to fight against

it, trying to protect your body from whatever this outside foreign

enemy, if you will do to it.

And so in an anaphylactic response, it goes so far as that, The person

having this experience, their airway will shut up so it'll close.

They can't breathe.

They'll get a higher heartbeat, like a faster heartbeat, and if epinephrine

is not provided, the person could die.

And we've seen that across the country in several different

unfortunate news stories.

And so that's why it's really important for school districts to have access

to EpiPens because of this reason.

And why it should be more of a concern is that every person, every

student's going to react differently.

So some students, Some people based on the allergy that they're allergic to,

it may take a minute or two, right?

So it's a little bit slower, but then you have some individuals

where it could be seconds.

I'm, it's seconds that it starts and you have very little time to help

this person overcome this response.

And that's why it's so important.

And there's a lot of liability there for someone that's trying to serve good meals.

That is the most extreme case.

And that's the one that most people focus on.

But there are other ones, especially as students that are younger, they

don't know how to use words yet.

They don't understand what's going on.

And You will see rashes, upset stomach maybe hives around the mouth.

It doesn't always have to be around the mouth, but those are just an example.

Like you said, sneezing or kind of a stuffy nose type of a thing.

Those are all reactions.

Once again, every person's different, so it's hard to nail it every time, but

you'll see kiddos that have start having these reactions young, they'll come up

and say my tummy doesn't feel good, or my lips feel big, and I can't feel them.

Those are good signs that they're having a reaction to some kind

of food that they just consume.

Oh my goodness.

This seems like such a, it just seems like such a severe and serious issue.

And I talk to districts all the time, and it seems like a lot of these districts,

either aren't preparing for this or they don't even really have it on their radar.

And to my understanding, there's also only one state at the moment, which

is the state of Illinois, which has a recently mandated allergen, formal

allergen training for all food handlers in all industries, across retail

food service schools and everything.

And I guess the question that I have is, Why are more

people not talking about this?

And why is this not being something that is, is promoted inside of our

districts as being a serious thing that we need to train our folks on?

And also what would the training even look like?

What are the steps for putting together kind of an allergy

response plan for districts?

Yeah, those are great questions.

And, a lot of it I don't want people to think that, I think food service

directors or the school nutrition professionals are negligent and they don't

care about their kids because they do.

And I know they do.

I've seen it in their faces, right?

So that's what we're not saying that they are negligent.

I think a lot of it comes down to, since COVID, we've had a very

fluctuating environment, right?

Labor shortages, product issues and all of these wear down on one person,

especially most school districts will have one person as the director.

And so there's a lot of hats to juggle.

They're trying to manage staff.

They're trying to put claims in, they're doing all of these other compliance needs.

And so it just, Hasn't bubbled up to the top of the list, especially

in those smaller communities where, you know, everyone, right?

Like you just know them.

So you have that personal connection.

And so I think that's a lot of it.

I, having spoken with a lot of school districts and food service directors,

it's just something that they are concerned about, but they're not able to

actually get their hands around it yet.

They don't have the time or capacity.

Capacity to do it.

And that's why I'm here, right?

It should be something because more and more I'm seeing more and more

complex, like we talked about but in terms of training, really, we could

talk about this in several levels.

One part that I will we can talk about in a second is communication.

That's the biggest thing here.

It sounds really simple, but that is what makes this work in terms

of a food allergy management plan.

In terms of training, like a back to school training, talking about,

the big nine with your staff is a good start that helps them to be

aware of it and to understand that.

But I like to really focus on what is, your main course of action.

cafeteria manager that knows every student in the building.

What if she or he gets sick or, is not with us for a week for whatever

reason that may be who's going to know who's going to be able to step

up and make sure that these kiddos are fed safely and healthfully.

That's what I always think about in terms of training.

Like, how do I stack the bench?

If you will.

Yeah, absolutely.

And one thing that just came to mind is, I feel like some of these

districts that maybe don't have students that they are aware of that

have any known allergens at the moment.

I feel like those are the districts that, are, putting this off because it's not

something that's immediately relevant.

There's more important things that they need to deal with, but it sounds like what

you're saying is, take the steps now and make sure that you're prepared for when it

happens, as opposed to being reactionary to a problem, let's respond to this,

issue that we have across the country and let's put the things in place so that

we have the tools available to our team.

Should something ever happen or should we need those tools?

Yeah, thank you for explicitly stating that.

That's exactly what I'm saying and really it's not so much too, if you can think

about it in this way from that example you gave we're assuming that no one

in the community really has a personal connection with someone with an allergy

and that's, and that, experience, which is common, that can happen, right?

But the more we can educate and once again, communicate this out.

So parents know like most of the time an allergy has started

with a little person, right?

They have the reaction for the very first time.

And I've had to speak with a lot of parents that are like, I've never

had a food allergy in my family.

I don't know what to do.

I'm waiting on the doctor and I don't even know how to shop.

So I've had to do those like one on one counseling almost.

Like how do you get this family ready for this new lifestyle change?

And yeah, education, awareness.

Communication is all important.

And I think at school districts, we should be educating our community on what

these food allergies are, at least like at the minimum, just so that they know.

It's so interesting because, you talk about communicating with

like families and students and, really helping them navigate,

something that's brand new to them.

As a father, I've got two, two boys, I've got a three year old and a five year old.

And the day that they're born is the most joyous day of your life.

That you've got this nice, bouncing, beautiful baby in your hands.

You the doctors are checking in on you at the hospital.

And then the time comes, it's usually like a day or two after the

baby's born, you're still elated.

And then they're like, Here's the child and we'll see you whenever, or we won't

see you ever again, but good luck.

There's no manual for raising kids.

There's no if this problem happens, go to this person.

If this issue occurs, go here.

There's not a step by step guide.

And so for a lot of people, very fortunately they don't have any major

issues that they have to deal with.

Like you mentioned like one in 13 students and things of that nature.

So it's when you're looking at that yeah, sure, the majority of people

don't have to deal with this, but for the folks that do have to deal

with this being a very serious issue, you don't have a handbook to follow.

So you're gonna be just looking for resources.

So having a school district that is Properly trained on this information has

the resources available is going to be that resource that so many families are

going to be desperately searching out.

Yes, you're so right.

And you can take it even a step further, right?

Like most of these parents are trying to figure out a new menu schedule,

what to buy from the grocery store.

And if our schools can already be prepared and have those products.

Not that they have to have them on stock on hand every time,

but they know where to get them.

And they know how to set that process up because we've already done it.

They just have to, implement it.

We are now able to feed these kids, most of their meal for the day.

So they don't have to worry.

The parent doesn't have to worry about what if they have a reaction

and I don't have the food for them?

That's a very basic level need that Parents, right?

They want to they want to make sure they do that for their kids.

I think preparing for it helps you not just to solve the issue for the little

one, the student, but also for the family.

And that's what this is about.

So if a school district, another question for you.

So if a school district is, Maybe they don't have a an

allergy management plan in place.

What would be your suggestion to a school district that say, that's

listening to this saying, you know what, I want to put something in place.

What's like a one, two punch either resource or some steps that you

would point a new district to?

in to create this, allergy awareness plan or allergy management plan.

Yeah, for sure.

So the top three websites that kind of come to mind in terms of free, right?

So that would be a barrier potentially would be CDCs.

If you just Google CDC school allergy toolkit you'll find that.

Tons of resources there.

FARE, F A R E.

That is more focused on the community and parents and

students, but that's also helpful.

They have good fact sheets you can download and make sure your staff

understand the basics of the Big Nine.

And then Also ICN, so Institute of Culinary Institute of

Culinary, why am I blanking?

I need more coffee.

Shell Nutrition.

Thank you.

Yeah.

They have SOPs ready that you can download and make, edit

and to make into your own plan.

So they have, there's a lot of good things out there that you can use.

The National Peanut Board honestly has some really good tips and

tricks of how to communicate with administrators or teachers as well.

So there's a lot of good resources out there.

I would say to start there.

And what I say a lot too when I'm training people about this is understand

what you're What research do you need and have, what do you not have in your

toolkit and what do you need to find out?

So a needs assessment first, understand what you're getting

into and what community or your school environment needs.

And then from there I'm sure people have heard me talk before.

They're going to be like, Oh my gosh, of course, start communicating.

So we, there's a lot of people that get their hands on the documentation that.

Gives us information about what a student needs, right?

And so we need to start opening those doors to the school nurse.

Sometimes it's the school secretary or the front office individual,

cause they actually receive the documents from the family.

It could be a social worker or a counselor obviously school nutrition staff

obviously teachers, but understand how this kind of, the process works currently

and who's missing from the table.

So that's the big Two steps I would focus on.

Awesome.

And then as far as communication, cause you brought that up a couple of times now

as, being something extremely important we always talk about communication.

I speak to school districts.

I know you speak to school districts and communication is usually one

of those topics that a director of a school district is like,

Hey, you're going to come in, talk about effective communication.

What does communication though look like when you're consulting with a school

district, what are some suggestions that you make to the school district?

On how to effectively communicate to the parents and the students.

Is it social media?

Is it emails?

Is it, is it some type of a board meeting?

What does that look like as far as effective communication when

it comes to allergy awareness?

Yeah so every school district is different.

So that this doesn't, it's not a one size fits all, unfortunately but I really focus

on identifying who are the stakeholders that need to be at the table and then

trying to evaluate who isn't at the table that should be and so the, Based

on the stakeholders involved, right?

You have a lot of different communication terms or ways you can do this.

Several school districts have some technology in place where they

can text message parents, which is a really good technology to use.

But, yeah, I would say to identify What are those platforms

that parents, students, other staff members utilize well?

Is it email?

I don't, I don't know.

Everyone's a little different and then communicate through there.

But also in that process, you want to, I, I identify like, especially for this

documentation that's required by school districts for the food service side.

Who's talking to these parents and who, what are they saying, right?

We want to have a streamlined communication process so a parent

doesn't feel confused and they know from the beginning I do step

A, B, and C and this is how it happens and my kid is accommodated.

That's really what I'm wanting to focus on with these schools is having

a consistent message so parents aren't.

confused or, something's brought out of the blue sky that they had no

idea to, that they needed to think about and just be upfront with that.

Transparency and just being open minded.

Like I said, a lot of times these parents, this is the first time

they're ever having to deal with it.

So how do you listen to them?

A lot of communication is listening.

So how do you make them come in and feel heard while also educating

them about the process and how we can accommodate their student.

Yeah, absolutely.

So in as we come to the closing of our time here, I'd love to know,

are there any questions regarding allergens or allergen awareness that

you wish more directors were asking?

Or are there any questions that you wish people, when they bring you in

to consult with them, would ask you?

Yeah.

That's a really great question.

I think there's two fold one at one's on the education side and one is on the

process side or the communication side.

In terms of education I think more people should ask like, how

do I read the nutrition facts label and how do I utilize that?

Like actually in my day what does that mean for me?

Because that can help our school nutrition staff and also can help someone

personally, at the grocery store, right?

So there's a lot of good that can come from that information that's right there.

And then the other one in terms of process is like being what can I do to make

this smoother, this process smoother?

Who should I be thinking of?

Those are the questions I wish people would really ask

because sometimes not like that.

They're trying to forget someone.

It's just, there's more to the story than what we can see from our perspective.

And if we're able to step back a bit and have a better idea

of the holistic approach here, we can serve our kiddos better.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Tara, thank you so much for having for coming on the show and chatting

about allergens and sharing some of your amazing wisdom on the topic.

Is there any parting words of wisdom, advice, anything that you'd like to leave

our listeners and viewers with today?

Why, before we wrap things up.

Yeah.

Thank you so much for having me on.

Wes, I really appreciated the chat and the time.

I would say, I hear you food service directors, school nutrition professionals.

I've been there.

I'm still in it with you in the thick of it.

And even if this is something you want to attain and you're, you feel like you

can't now, it is an attainable goal.

And everyone has a different starting place.

What we talked earlier, Wes, like maybe just start with one easy step.

Just identify one thing.

Maybe that first step is going to one of the websites we mentioned

and downloading the resources there and sending them to your staff.

That's an easy one step.

And I think that's a doable thing.

So find out where you are in the current moment and be willing just

to take one little step forward.

Said.

We'll put all of those links in the bio so that people can easily get to them.

We'll try and make it as easy as possible for them to take that first step.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you again for being on the show.

I really appreciate it.

It was a pleasure chatting with you and we look forward to

hopefully having you on again soon.

Yeah.

Thank you so much.

All right.

Take care.

Look forward to it.

Bye.