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Public schools in the United States are required to provide our children with not only an education, but also a safe environment in which to learn. As a health care professional and mother of a child with life-threatening peanut allergy, I have become passionate about the peanut debate.

Everyone agrees that children and their families need to be responsible for avoiding appropriate allergens. Some children have such a severe allergy to peanuts, they will have a life-threatening reaction if someone opens a container of peanuts or if peanut products are being cooked in a room that shares ventilation ducts with the room the child is in. My three-year-old will change tables if someone sits down with peanut products. She knows to ask if there are peanuts when she's given food by someone other than a parent or grandparent. I am well aware that my child's allergies are my family's issue, not society's problem.

We are not talking about kids who decide to try someone's peanut butter sandwich. We are talking about a child dying because the cafeteria chef decided to make peanut butter bars in the room down the hall. If peanut products are allowed in schools, who's going to pay for the full-time private tutoring of the thousands of children with severe peanut allergies? The school system is required to provide them with an education, but I am confident the courts will not require parents to knowingly put their children's lives in jeopardy every school day just so peanuts can be allowed in public schools.

Learn more about this author, Tracy L. Russell.
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