When he was nine months old, Spencer Petticrew’s parents tried to give him a single pea.
The pea didn’t quite make it into his mouth, but only brushed his lips, his mother, Sherri Pettcrew, said. However, Spencer turned bright red within 30 seconds, and started having difficulty breathing. The Petticrews rushed their son to an emergency room, where doctors determined that Spencer had a severe food allergy.
“His entire face turned red, he got hives all over his body and he couldn’t breathe and we had to go to the emergency room,” she said. “It wasn’t until he was almost two that we came into Juneau and saw his allergist.”
The allergist eventually determined that Spencer was allergic to nuts, beans, legumes, shell fish, fish, mango and kiwi.
The allergy was so sensitive and severe that Spencer, now 7 years old and in the second grade, has had special dietary restrictions ever since, Sherri Petticrew said. He’s been surrounded by devices that administer adrenaline in the event of a reaction, including at Evergreen Elementary School, where officials determined he was too young to carry an injector himself, but stationed seven devices at various places around the school, according to school system documents provided by the Petticrews.
Any contact – even secondhand contact – with one of the foods could trigger an allergic reaction known as anaphylaxis, which can result in death. Together, peanut allergies and tree nut allergies account for between 65 and 92 percent of all deaths resulting from anaphylactic shock in the United States, according to figures provided by Mary Bell, a nurse with the Alaska Department of Health and Social Services.
School officials have long been aware of Spencer’s issues, Petticrew said.
“He (Spencer) did kindergarten there (Evergreen), he did first grade there, never had a problem,” she said. “We’ve never had an issue. Everybody else is still doing what they’re supposed to do … the lunchroom, awesome, (secretary) Renata Davies, awesome.”
Spencer will finish the second grade in Juneau this year. His parents withdrew him from Evergreen over concerns that a teacher wasn’t taking the condition seriously, and because the school system “would not provide another teacher for our son,” Sherri Petticrew wrote in a nine-page letter to the Department of Education and local school board members containing her account of the decision. She provided a copy of the letter to the Sentinel, in part because of a letter to the editor in the Nov. 14 issue of the Sentinel written by Aaron Angerman (a fiancé of the teacher), but also because of what she characterized as a “cold shoulder” from local education officials.
Angerman’s letter deals primarily with issues surrounding the abuse of Facebook, apart from the last paragraph.
“There is no job more important in this world than educating our children, and it takes the entire staff and community,” his letter reads in part. “Unfortunately, teaching can be a thankless position. We are lucky to have the educational staff that we do.”
Angerman declined to clarify his letter to the editor further.
School officials and board members also declined comment on the issue in part because they are legally constrained from public comment on personnel issues surrounding a teacher, identified by Sherri Petticrew as Mikki Kaupilla. Kaupilla declined to comment because the matter was under investigation.
“There’s too many confidentiality issues for us,” said superintendent Rich Rhodes. “The district does recognize that there were compliance issues regarding nut allergies and 504 plans and are moving forward to do more to recognize those things.”
District officials do not comment on disciplinary proceedings, Rhodes added.
Problems related to Spencer’s allergy started when the second-grade students were combined into a single classroom in August, according to Petticrew’s letter. Richard and Sherri Petticrew met with Kaupilla, Rhodes, and a teaching aide to discuss the district’s plan for Spencer, according to the letter. At the Aug. 26 meeting, Kaupilla signed a document known as a “504 plan” after Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, according to the letter.
The act prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability for any institution or organization receiving federal funds.
The plan, a copy of which Sherri Petticrew provided to the Sentinel, lays out special actions required on the part of school officials to ensure Spencer can receive an education. Conditions of the plan include: not feeding Spencer any allergic foods; not feeding Spencer any food he didn’t bring with him to school; including baked goods or ice cream for birthdays; not sitting next to any student eating those foods, keeping nuts and legumes out of the classroom altogether; requiring other students to wash their hands after lunch; early notification of field trips.
Kaupilla routinely didn’t follow the conditions of the plan, Sherri Petticrew’s letter says. Students washed their hands in a communal bucket, potentially creating a situation which could have exposed Spencer to allergic triggers, the letter says. Sherri Petticrew also claims she wasn’t adequately notified of a field trip on Oct. 9, something required by the 504 plan. On Oct. 11, according to the letter, Richard Petticrew entered the classroom to discover Kauppila eating nuts at her desk in a classroom labeled nut-free. The letter claims that when Kauppila saw Richard Petticrew, she put them away in a cupboard also containing an epinephrine device used to treat Spencer’s anaphylaxis.
“Ms. Kauppila had Spencer sit next to her desk/table to eat his snacks every day,” the letter reads in part. “Ms. Kauppila personally ate nut products in a nut-free classroom right next to where she had our son sit to eat his snack every day.”
Three days later, Richard Petticrew confronted Kauppila about the issue, but the letter claims Kauppila refused to speak with him. When Richard Petticrew went to the school principal to discuss the situation, the letter says, Kuappila was told to remove all nuts from the classroom.
The final straw came the next day, when Richard Petticrew arrived at school to find Kauppila handing out peanut butter-filled candy to her pupils, according to the letter.
“That night we decided we did not feel safe taking Spencer to school on Tuesday,” the letter reads. “When you are specifically told by your supervisor to “get all the nuts out of the class,” you do not then hand out candy that same day with nuts in it! No rational person does that.”
The letter also characterizes Kaupilla’s attitude as unconcerned about the potentially life-threatening consequences of these alleged actions.
“Ms. Kauppila has told Richard more than once that Spencer should be exposed to nuts,” the letter reads in part. “She told him that they all needed to eat nuts in class so they can all learn to manage this allergy. Richard immediately told me this, to which I was a little shocked.”
Attempts to discuss the issue with Kauppila went nowhere, Sherri Petticrew said.
“Every time my husband Richard would try to talk to her about things, she would completely blow him off,” she said.
Sherri Petticrew characterized her exchanges with school officials as amiable but unproductive.
“Every time we had a problem and we went to (Rhodes) about it, he was usually out of town, first of all, because he’s trying to be superintendent and principal, which is fine,” she said. “He would say, ‘Okay I’m gonna take care of it. I’m going to talk to her, I’m going to take care of it.’”
“Rhodes is great,” she added. “I think the problem was, he kept saying ‘I’m gonna take care of it.’”
Rhodes took over his dual duties this year as part of a cost-saving measure on the part of the district. He was in Washington, D.C. this week to lobby for a continuation of secure rural schools funding. Monday’s board meeting agenda did not contain an item relating to a (typically, rare) executive session, a possible indicator of a confidential personnel issue reaching the board level, though personnel issues can often be resolved without formal board action. The December agenda, which officials said had not yet been finalized, doesn’t contain an item relating to an executive session, district officials said.
However, those promises weren’t met with a corresponding action in the classroom, Petticrew said.
“I don’t know if he didn’t talk to her,” she said. “I’m not sure where the break down is.”
“In my conversations with (Rhodes), he seemed to understand, and he seemed to get it,” she added. “I don’t know if that wasn’t passed on.”
Rhodes has written a letter personally apologizing for the situation and pledging to do a better job in the future, Petticrew said.
“That’s great, but what have you (Rhodes) done about the situation?” she said. “What have you done about the teacher? The fact that there’s still no consequences for her, for the risk that she took. My kid’s seven, you know? He’s seven.”
In the weeks since Spencer’s parents took him out of the school, Sherri Petticrew, who lives in Juneau and commutes to Wrangell on weekends, says she’s heard disturbing rumors about Kaupilla’s lack of remorse and the school board’s lack of action.
“It’s just hard to get past that,” she said. “Not only is the school not doing anything, the school board is not doing anything. Anybody who knows the facts of what happened, they’re horrified.”
Sherri Petticrew says she was told she can no longer use the system’s formal complaint process because Spencer is no longer a student in the school system. For the Petticrews, the decision was difficult given their ties to Wrangell (Richard Petticrew is a local fisherman), but necessary, Sherri Petticrew wrote in her letter.
“Spencer needs to worry about learning fractions this year, not worry that his teacher is not looking out for his safety,” the letter reads. “There will come a day when Spencer is a responsible person for his own safety; but not yet.”
Food allergies affect somewhere between 4 and 6 percent of U.S. Children, according the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
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