Youth Services Litigation Blog : Georgia Youth-Serving Organization Lawyer & Attorney : Debbie Ausburn Law Firm : Youth Camps, Day Care, Social Services

I ran across this study, from Clinical Pediatrics, analyzing injuries to children from furniture tip-overs. The researchers found a significant increase in injuries in the last 18 years, with televisions being the most-common furniture to tip over.

I have seen a lot of news reports of children being seriously hurt  by falling televisions in schools or day care centers.  In some cases, the staff apparently was not properly supervising the children, and in others, the center might not have properly secured the television. 

Consumer Reports has an article with some excellent suggestions for protecting children around televisions, including:

• anchoring the furniture holding the television

• keeping toys, food, and other temptations off the top of televisions and other tall furniture

• watching for recalls of carts and furniture that you may be using for your television

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A teenager in Texas died last month from swine flu.  What struck me about this particular report is that he also had an MRSA infection at the time.   Last year, a report in Pediatrics magazine noted a five-fold increase in flu deaths where a child also had MRSA.  Given the prevalence of MRSA in many communities, youth-serving organizations need to be as alert to the symptoms of MRSA as to flu symptoms.

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The CDC has issued an updated bulletin for early childhood programs on how to respond to an outbreak of the H1N1 virus.  At the head of the list is vaccinations, both ordinary flu and H1N1 (when available) for staff.  Next, the CDC recommends having staff and children stay home for at least 3-5 days after exhibiting flu symptoms.  The CDC also recommends frequent health checks, separating staff and children who exhibit flu symptoms, and renewed attention to environmental cleanliness and handwashing.

The most difficult recommendation to follow is likely to be having staff stay home for at least 3-5 days, or longer if the flu symptoms persist.   Few schools or child care centers have extra staff sitting around, and finding substitutes on short notice for sick staff members will be a constant challenge.  Groups will have to find creative solutions this flu season, whether banding together to share a pool of on-call, trained substitute teachers, or just hiring an extra staff person or two in anticipation of the inevitable illnesses over the next few months.

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The Department of Justice has issued a report about bullying in schools.  It is part of the COPS series, so is geared toward school resource officers, but has some good information for administrators as well.  Some of the research that it cites suggests that a principal's involvement in addressing the problem contributes to fewer incidents. It also recommends such common-sense strategies as increasing supervision in "hot spot" areas, and perhaps even redesigning the environment.

I disagree with one strategy, which is "developing a comprehensive reporting system to track bullying and the interventions used with specific bullies and victims."  It is a good idea in theory, but, if not done effectively, will just provide ammunition for an opposing attorney in a lawsuit.  Like any school policy, do not create the policy unless you are going to follow and enforce it.  The only thing worse than no policy is a well-written policy that no one follows.

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There are some very good new resources for dealing with swine flu.  The CDC has published a new website for child care providers.  The Department of Health and Human Services and the CDC have combined to create a checklist for day care centers and preschools.   The American Academy of Pediatrics has a similar publication.

Although these resources are geared toward child care centers, every youth-serving organization should review them.  They offer good advice and common-sense suggestions that will help you continue your program while protecting your clients.

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The latest problem that day care centers, schools, and camps need to know about is swine flu.  The illness is spreading, and may become our next epidemic.  Like so many illnesses, children are at high risk.  There is no effective vaccine, and only limited treatment options.

You can take some common-sense precautions to hep protect your clients:

*  Enforce rigorous hand-washing protocols.

* If children are sneezing and coughing, anyone who comes into contact with them must wash their hands before touching anyone or anything else.

* Children who exhibit flu-like symptoms should be isolated from the general population and sent home with parents as soon as possible.

* Check with your local or state health department to learn what specific precautions authorities are recommending for your area.

* Monitor the CDC website for updated recommendations

* Watch websites related to your industry, such as the American Camping Association's summary of  precautions.

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A Nashville school district has fired three employees after discovering that a middle school teacher was hired despite an outstanding criminal warrant for child molestation.  This story illustrates the pitfalls of relying too heavily on routine criminal background checks.  The accused teacher, Ronald Boykin, had no criminal conviction, but had been wanted for two years in another city in the state.

According to news reports, the district fired the employees for lax hiring practices.   Apparently Boykin actually noted on his application that he was under criminal investigation, although it is not clear whether he specified what was being investigated.  The district employes also failed to re-check his application when he transferred from a support position to being a teacher.

The first line of defense in any youth-serving organization is a thorough application  interview.  One of the best resources on screening employees, including how to conduct an interview, is the CDC's publication about policies and procedures.  It is free, and available for download here.  

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In a tragic incident in New York, a two-year-old girl choked to death on a carrot stick she found in her teacher's bag.   Many adults do not realize how dangerous small, hard foods can be for young children. The American Academy of Pediatrics has a list of dangerous foods, including such common foods as chunks of peanut butter or apples.

The center owner, acting on either good instincts or good advice, issued a well-crafted statement to the media, saying, "We are providing counseling support for our staff who were with the child and offer our total support, thought and prayers for the child's family."

Hat tip:  Minor Troubles

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 The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia has some good videos about installing car seats or booster seats.  If your agency uses car or booster seats, it would be a good idea to have your employees review these videos.

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There is no avoiding the story of the day care center in Arkansas that accidentally served windshield washer fluid to 10 children.  Fortunately, there seem to be no lasting injuries to the children.  The lesson here is so obvious as to leave me almost speechless.  Does any adult really need to be told to always check the label before serving something to children?

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You never want an article about your day care center to begin, ""Twenty-one children and one adult have contracted E. coli."  You particularly don't want it to note that the outbreak was "linked to a lack of handwashing."

At least the day care has taken responsibility for sanitizing the center,  and is trying to reimburse parents for out-of-pocket medical costs and expenses of having to stay home with their children.  Even if it were only a PR move, it would still be the right thing to do.

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It is nice to be able to post about a day care center that did everything right when faced with a bomb threat. The director of a day care center in Jacksonville Beach arrived at work to find a note on her desk saying that there was a bomb in the school.  Donna Jordan called the police, then evacuated the center.  

Because she and the staff conduct monthly fire drills, the children thought it was a drill and no one became alarmed.  While the police took their bomb-sniffing dog through the facility, Jordan took the younger children to a nearby bakery.  "They thought they were on a field trip," Jordan said.  Police found no bomb and are investigating the note.

Hat tip: Florida Child Injury Lawyer Blog

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The U.S. Supreme Court's ruled last week that  a student who has been sexually harassed can sue the school and individual administrators under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.  There has been plenty of legal analysis of the decision, so I decided to blog about the underlying problem of child-on-child abuse.

That particular case started when a kindergarten child told her parents that other children were coercing her into exposing herself on the school bus.  The parents were not satisfied with the school's response, and eventually sued.  This case is rare only in that it made it all the way to the Supreme Court.  Child-on-child abuse in youth organizations actually is more common than abuse by adults. The problem for supervisors is knowing how to respond.

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An excellent post on Outdoor Ed Community has some information that you should pass on to everyone in your organization who might ever need to perform CPR.  It discusses recent research in "agonal breathing," or gasping and moaning sounds in people who don't have a pulse.

The important take-away for us is that these breathing sounds are not adequate breathing, and no one should stop or delay CPR thinking that the person is breathing on his or her own.

The American Heart Association has more information about agonal breathing here and here.

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A day care employee in Illinois has been charged with murder for throwing a child to the floor, causing a fatal skull fracture.  It is impossible to know from the other details we have now, but this tragedy may have resulted from something as simple as a snap decision by a normally caring staff member.

Young adults often do not understand how easy it is to hurt children, even with seemingly-minor actions that would not affect an adult.  Day care centers need to constantly train their workers about the risks of corporal punishment and rough handling.  Enforcing the rules is important, but helping employees understand the reasons underlying those rules may prevent their forgetting them in a moment of frustration.

This is a terrible tragedy that never should have happened.

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The Florida ADR Law blog has an interesting post about a recent decision by the Florida Supreme Court, which held that liability waivers that parents sign for their children to participate in commercial activities are not enforceable.   The court reasoned that the right to  recover for injuries is personal to children, and that parents do not have the authority to waive that right before a child sustains injuries. The court cited a long of list of other states that follow the same rule.

The court's ruling is sure to be controversial on several fronts.  

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The NAEYC website has an excellent article about academics v. play in preschool programs.  Parents tend to want to see their children making progress in academic areas, a preference that puts pressure on teachers and administrators to be seen "teaching" instead of "playing."  The NAEYC article points out that good teaching works with the natural tendencies of children to be active and curious, using what looks like play to meet academic objectives.

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A school principal in St. Louise has been convicted of a misdemeanor for failing to report possible abuse.  Mr. Sirna was investigating the claims, and believed that he needed to have more information before calling police.  The prosecutor, jury, and judge disagreed.

I am sympathetic to the desire to investigate claims in-house, and am skeptical about the wisdom of the "call first, investigate later" motto.  Even though I have worked as a prosecutor and social worker, I am not convinced that child protection workers or even police investigators can investigate a claim better than an experienced school principal.  But the law is what it is, and most mandated reporter statutes do not leave much leeway for internal investigations before reporting a child's claims.  Don't put your career on the line -- call first and investigate later.

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The National Association of Child Care Resource & Referral Agencies (NACCRRA) has published a report about its partnership with the military, analyzing the results of efforts to improve child care for military families.  It offers numerous recommendations for Congressional action.  I generally am not a fan of federal intervention in traditional state matters, and the report spends a lot of time bemoaning the lack of standards for home-based care without considering whether the benefits would outweigh the burdens of raising the standards.  Nevertheless, the report has some recommendations that states and local child care centers should consider implementing, such as nationwide background checks and extensive training for staff members.

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Scott Carroll and Mark Hoekstra have published the final report of their ground-breaking and controversial  study into how domestic violence affects, not only the children in the home, but those children's classmates.  The New York Times highlighted the working paper  this past summer, and it has reverberated ever since around the Internet and among social services professionals.

The study concluded that children from families filing domestic violence claims "significantly decrease their peers' reading and math test scores and significantly increase the misbehavior of others in the classroom."  Thus, "any intervention that reduces family conflict may well have larger positive effects than previously thought."

This study has profound implications not only for schools, but for public policy.  I generally dislike calls for public funding of this or that pet project, but child abuse prevention is one area that needs much more money, both public and private.  If the implications of domestic violence are as profound as this study indicates, then proven programs that reduce that violence are a wise, even necessary, investment.

Hat tip: Children and the Law Blog

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This holiday week seems a good time to consider the arguments from these experts that children need more free time.  The psychologists quoted in the article worry that children are losing the opportunity for unstructured time to explore and learn about their world.  They make a compelling argument that, as Kathy Hirsh-Pasek phrased it, "Play equals learning.  For too long we have divorced the two."

It is difficult for schools and preschools to leave children with unstructured time, particularly in this age of No Child Left Behind and standardized tests.  I understand the need to make certain that children actually are learning, but we do seem to be losing a lot of creativity in the process.  Free time and recess may turn out to be just as important as history or science class.

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Another study confirms conventional wisdom -- to get kids to eat more whole grains, sneak them into their diet.  A team at the University of Minnesota found that when school lunch rooms gradually added healthier flour to their breads, the kids did not notice the difference.  The students only started throwing the bread away when the percentage of whole grain flour reached 70 percent.

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 I plan to be at the NAEYC Conference in Dallas this week.  It looks like a great line-up of speakers and sessions.  If you're there, drop me a line and let's try to touch base.

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The CDC says in a new report  that food allergies in children rose by 18% from 1997 to 2007.  It lists the most common allergies, and notes that children under 5 are more likely to have allergies than older children.  (Hat tip: Child Safety Blog)

The report also says that 4 out of every 100 children has a food allergy, a fact that every organization serving food to children needs to take into account.  The USDA has several helpful fact sheets  with suggestions for accommodating food allergies in camps, day care centers, and schools.

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A day care worker in Texas was arrested after admitting to biting a child to teach him, she said, not to bite other children.   Naturally, the parents are "seeking legal representation." 

An earlier report of the incident includes a statement from the day care director.   Most lawyers advise their clients not to talk to the media, because statements you make can be used against you if the matter ends up in court.  The catch is that it always hurts the center's reputation when the only words a reporter can quote are "No comment."

I recommend that youth-serving organizations respond to media inquiries with four statements: (1) always, always, always express concern for the child, who is, after all, your primary responsibility; (2) identify any steps you have taken that can be made public (i.e., suspended the worker pending investigation); (3) always make clear that you are cooperating with authorities; and (4) explain that you cannot comment further about an ongoing investigation.

Resist the temptation to explain everything you know to a reporter.  Too much explanation will come back to haunt you.  You do need to establish your concern for the children in your program, but any more details need to wait until you have all of the facts.

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A few weeks ago, I spoke at the Georgia Association of Young Children (GAYC) annual conference, and in late September, I spoke at the conference for the Southeastern Section of the American Camping Association.  I thoroughly enjoyed both conferences.  It always is good to re-connect with old friends, and to remember why I enjoy so much working with people who work with kids.  

My topic in both seminars was how to implement the recent CDC guidelines on "Preventing Child Sexual Abuse in Youth-Serving Organizations" (PDF available here).   I helped edit the final report (finding my name on the acknowledgements page was pretty cool), and was impressed with how much work went into the project.  Given the CDC's stature, these guidelines are likely to become an important standard in the field.  The CDC imprimatur also means that the guidelines are likely to show up in lawsuits. Plenty of directors will find themselves answering a lawyer's question, "Did YOU implement the CDC's recommendation on page 4?" 

I hope to be at the ACA's National Conference in February.  If you're there, be sure to look me up and introduce yourself.

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Yet another expert report warns against yet another common (and educational) classroom tradition. The American Academy of Pediatrics has issued a policy statement warning against nontraditional pets in homes with children under 5.  The report also warns against taking children younger than 5 to petting zoos and other public places with exotic animals.  Although the report says nothing about classrooms, presumably the logic would apply to preschools and day care centers.

An AP article summarizes the reasons for the warning

Besides evidence that they can carry dangerous and sometimes potentially deadly germs, exotic pets may be more prone than cats and dogs to bite, scratch or claw — putting children younger than 5 particularly at risk, the report says. Young children are vulnerable because of developing immune systems plus they often put their hands in their mouths.

The list of pets that the AAP considers to be "nontraditional" includes turtles, hamsters, baby chicks, and hedgehogs.

Hat tip: DC Metro Area Personal Injury Law Blog

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A recent issue of Pediatrics journal reports an interesting study of scald burns in young children.   The study's authors found that a surprising number of young children were injured from getting hot liquids out of a microwave, while others were scalded by an older child carrying or cooking hot liquid.

Not surprisingly, the authors recommend close supervision of young children and further studies.

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This recent story from New Jersey illustrates a growing problem for schools, day care centers, and other organizations where children gather.  Methicillin-resistant staphylococcus areus (MRSA) infections are becoming more common, and more resistant to traditional antibiotic treatments.   We are seeing more lawsuits involving MRSA, usually based on claims that a child contracted it because the center (a) allowed infected children or staff members to continue attending the facility, or (b) failed to adequately disinfect common areas.

Some of the lawsuits are based on misconceptions, such as a belief that anyone suffering from MRSA should be quarantined.  The Centers for Disease Control has a very helpful webpage outlining what schools and other organizations can do to prevent and/or respond to MRSA.  Many state and local health departments also have pages on their websites.

Because the infection is becoming so common, be sure that you are taking precautions recommended by the health departments in your area.  Educate yourself about the initial symptoms, and what your licensing agency requires as far as reporting cases to health authorities and/or notifying other parents.

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The Archives of Psychiatric Nursing journal recently published a study confirming what experienced pre-school teachers already know, that ADHD and ODD children engage in significantly more risk-taking behavior.  The had some surprising findings about the severity of those injuries.

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