21 U.S.C. § 2205 — Food allergy and anaphylaxis management

This section sets up voluntary federal guidelines — and a grant program — to help schools and early childhood programs manage students' food allergies and anaphylaxis risk. (a) Definitions. "Early childhood education program" means a Head Start or Early Head Start program, a state-licensed or state-regulated child care program or school, or a state prekindergarten program serving children from birth through kindergarten. "Local educational agency," "secondary school," "elementary school," and "parent" have the meanings given in section 7801 of title 20. "School" includes public kindergartens, elementary schools, and secondary schools. "Secretary" means the Secretary of Health and Human Services. (b) Establishment of voluntary guidelines. (1) Within 1 year of January 4, 2011, the Secretary, working with the Secretary of Education, had to create voluntary guidelines schools and early childhood programs can use to build individual plans managing a child's food allergy and anaphylaxis risk, and share them with school systems, schools, programs, and other interested parties for voluntary use. Any individual plan built this way counts as an "education record" protected under FERPA. (2) The guidelines must address: (A) that before each school year, parents should give the school or program doctor documentation of a food-allergy diagnosis and any anaphylaxis risk, the allergen involved, prior reaction history, prescribed medication, emergency treatment steps, symptoms to watch for, and the child's readiness to self-administer medication, plus a list of acceptable substitute meals; (B) creating and maintaining, with the parent, an individual management plan for each at-risk child, including letting the child self-administer medication where they're capable and state law allows; (C) communication strategies with emergency medical responders; (D) ways to cut allergen exposure in classrooms and shared spaces; (E) sharing general allergy information with staff, parents, and children; (F) training staff who regularly work with at-risk children; (G) authorizing and training staff to give epinephrine when the nurse isn't immediately available; (H) making sure epinephrine is quickly accessible in that situation; (I) planning for anaphylaxis response during field trips, before- and after-school programs, and weekend school-sponsored events; (J) recordkeeping every time epinephrine is given, with prompt parent notification; and (K) anything else the Secretary decides is needed. (3) Nothing here overrides state law, including state rules on whether at-risk students may self-administer medication. (c) School-based grants. (1) The Secretary may award grants to school systems to help implement the (b) guidelines. (2) To apply, a school system must submit, in the form the Secretary requires: an assurance it has built plans following the guidelines; a description of what the grant will fund — including how the guidelines will work at individual schools, how parents and students will be informed, and how staff will be trained; an itemized budget; a monitoring plan; and a promise to report back as the Secretary requires. (3) Grant money can go toward supplies (including limited medical supplies like epinephrine and disposable wipes), staff training with local health departments, student education programs, parent outreach, or other activities consistent with the guidelines. (4) Grants can run up to 2 years, with second-year funding contingent on a successful first-year evaluation where the Secretary conducts one. (5) A school system can't receive more than 2 years of this grant funding, ever. (6) A single grant can't exceed $50,000 a year. (7) The Secretary must prioritize school systems with the highest share of children counted under the Title I formula in section 6333(c) of title 20. (8) The Secretary can't award a grant unless the school system agrees to provide non-federal matching funds of at least 25% of the grant — cash or in-kind, but not money that ultimately traces back to federal subsidies. (9) A school system can spend up to 2% of its grant on administrative costs. (10) After the grant period, the school system must report to the Secretary how the money was spent and how the guidelines are being implemented. (11) Grant funds must add to, not replace, existing non-federal and federal funding for these activities. (12) Congress authorized $30,000,000 for fiscal year 2011, plus whatever's needed for each of the next 4 years. (d) These guidelines are voluntary. (1) Nothing in this section or the guidelines requires any school system to follow them. (2) The one exception: if a school system agreed to implement the guidelines as a condition of getting a (c) grant, the Secretary can enforce that agreement.

The record shows that this section was enacted as part of Public Law 111–353, title I, section 112, on January 4, 2011, and published at 124 Stat. 3916. The source credit indicates one subsequent amendment, made by Public Law 114–95, title IX, section 9215(jj), enacted December 10, 2015, and published at 129 Stat. 2175. Beyond identifying the enacting and amending statutes and their dates, the source credit does not itself describe the substance of the amendment or the reasons for it. Public Law 111–353 is commonly known as the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act, a broad statute generally understood to have reformed the federal food safety regulatory system in response to a series of high-profile foodborne illness outbreaks in the years preceding its passage. The inclusion of a provision addressing food allergy and anaphylaxis management in schools is consistent with that era's wider public attention to food-related health risks, including rising awareness of childhood food allergies, though the record here does not establish the specific legislative rationale for this particular section. Public Law 114–95 is widely recognized as the Every Student Succeeds Act, a major reauthorization of federal elementary and secondary education law. Its amendment of this section (jj) likely reflects a conforming update tied to that broader education law reauthorization, such as updated cross-references to education statutes, but the source credit does not specify the amendment's content, and no further inference should be drawn about its purpose.