Ankeny schools biting down on Valentine's Day treats

Valentine’s Day parties will be a little less sweet for Ankeny students this year.

A new policy bans homemade and store-bought treats from classroom celebrations. School officials say it protects students with food allergies and those unable to afford store-bought snacks.

But the decision is not sitting well with some parents.

While Ankeny has nixed treats, a teacher in Des Moines planned to abandon the traditional student card exchange to spare potential hurt feelings. She later relented after parents objected.

Nationwide, schools are eliminating Valentine’s Day and Halloween parties and replacing them with generic celebrations. One school district in St. Paul, Minnesota, has banned traditional holidays altogether in the name of cultural sensitivity.

It's part of a growing debate among educators and parents about how to protect children — both physically and emotionally — without trampling on traditional childhood experiences.

Matt Adams, Ankeny schools' chief operations officer, said the policy change was made to ensure every student can participate in classroom parties. Food is still allowed, but it must be purchased through the district’s food service department. The district’s policy says food service items are healthier and limit exposure to allergens.

“It is important to us that students with dietary and/or financial restrictions not be excluded from school parties, and have an equitable experience to that of their peers,” Adams said.

According to a food order sheet for Friday's “friendship parties,” it costs $16.80 to order two-dozen cookies or $24 for two-dozen Rice Krispies bars. Two dozen packets of baby carrots with ranch is $18.

The school district encouraged students to bring trinkets like pencils, erasers or small toys to exchange with classmates.

Crystal Walker-Smith, a parent of a fourth-grader at Rock Creek Elementary School, said that often comes at a higher cost than a $3 bag of Dum Dums. Another parent, Beth Akers, said many parents don’t want to add more “party favors” to their growing collections at home. “They’ll likely get tossed out,” she said.

Walker-Smith said her daughter, Cammi, is less interested in celebrating the holiday once treats were taken away. Some of her friends aren’t participating.

There have been students with food allergies in Cammi's classroom every year, and parents have always been able to work around it before, Walker-Smith said.

“It’s just frustrating," she said. "I get it to a certain point, but I think they’ve taken it too far."

Alyson Pearson, a licensed independent social worker at Central Iowa Psychological Services, said it’s important for students to learn how to accommodate others and make compromises. But as a parent of a child with severe food allergies, she said it’s also important for her daughter to learn “that the whole world will not accommodate her.”

“You don’t have to get rid of things because it doesn’t work for everybody. You just tweak things to find what works,” she said. “That’s kind of what life is about.”

A.J. Spiker, former chairman of the Iowa Republican Party, questioned where school districts should draw the line — if they serve pork in the cafeteria it could be restrictive for Muslim and Jewish students or beef for Hindu students.

While allergies are a concern, clear guidelines can be laid out to avoid sickness, he said.

“Ultimately it’s a school district issue, and if it’s going too far, if enough parents call and enough members of the local school board agree, I guarantee you they can have silly policies like that overturned,” Spiker said.

At Cowles Montessori School in Windsor Heights, one teacher considered eliminating card exchanges. That idea has since been nixed, said Principal Gregory Grylls.

Pearson said hurt feelings can be a legitimate concern for young students, who may not be able to brush off ego blows as easily as an adult.

“Kids are in a place where their world is their mirror, so whatever happens around them, that’s how they view themselves,” she said. “If another kid gets a sucker and they don’t, then that means something about them.”

Phillip Roeder, director of communications and public affairs for Des Moines Public Schools, said these types of decisions are made on a classroom-by-classroom basis. Some teachers at high-poverty schools may choose not to hold card or candy exchanges due to financial concerns, he said.

“Given that there are a lot of high-poverty schools in the district, expecting kids to go out and buy cards or treats for special occasions can be a burden, and the last thing we want to do is have a student feel left out or embarrassed,” he said.

But Des Moines Public Schools does not ban store-bought items from classroom parties. Classrooms can serve prepackaged foods, and most encourage healthy treats like fruits and vegetables, Roeder said.

West Des Moines has an across-the-board ban on classroom treats that contain peanuts due to allergy concerns, but it does not prohibit other store-bought items, according to district spokeswoman Elaine Watkins-Miller.

Kristin Danley-Greiner contributed to this report.