5 School Camp Safety Tips I Wish I Knew Before My Son’s Camp
Most school camp safety advice treats food allergies like a checkbox on a form.
I know that knot in your stomach when the camp permission slip arrives. You want your child to experience the same adventures as their classmates: the kayaking with friends, the campfire s’mores, the independence that comes from three days away from home. But you also know that a single contaminated surface could turn those memories into a medical emergency.
The letters home ask you to "provide medication" and "notify staff of dietary requirements" as though managing anaphylaxis is comparable to requesting vegetarian meals. These phrases tell you nothing about whether teachers truly understand what cross-contamination means or how they'll supervise food sharing when 60 kids are making damper over campfires.
And here's what keeps us up at night: you won't discover the gaps in their protocol until your child is three hours from the nearest hospital.
These tips dig deeper than the standard medical forms because I've learned that keeping our children safe while letting them have these experiences requires us to ask better questions.
Tip 1: "Nut-Free Camp" Means Nothing Without Kitchen Protocols
Every school will reassure you the camp is nut-free. I understand why that phrase feels comforting. I wanted to believe it too. But what they often don't explain is how they actually enforce this when 30 families pack their children's luggage at home, unsupervised.
What everyone says: "We run a nut-free camp and ask all families not to pack nuts."
What actually works: Ask about their bag check system, food storage protocols, and what happens when a child arrives with a Nutella sandwich.
Why: Here's the reality that most schools don't acknowledge: a nut-free policy is only as good as its enforcement. The danger isn't the school's carefully planned meals, it's the contraband peanut m&m’s, the birthday treat a well-meaning parent packed, and the camp kiosk selling mixed lollies without individual ingredient labels.
When I prepared for my son's Year 5 camp, I felt anxious asking these questions. I didn't want to be "that parent." But I asked the coordinator to walk me through their actual process, and her detailed response changed everything.
She explained: all bags checked on arrival with any high-risk items confiscated and stored separately, all food kept in a locked cupboard accessible only to staff, and a teacher positioned at every meal to monitor trading and sharing. One school even photographed the process and sent it to allergy families beforehand.
"The most dangerous moments at camp aren't during the meals staff have prepared. They're when kids are swapping snacks in cabins at night and nobody's thinking about allergens."
Tip 2: Adrenaline Auto-Injectors Need a Management System, Not Just a Backpack
Every school asks you to provide EpiPens. You've done this countless times: for excursions, for sports days, for after-school activities. But school camp is different, and we both know it.
The technical detail that separates safe camps from tragedies waiting to happen is the medication accessibility system. Here's the exact method that matters:
Setup: Multiple EpiPens in different locations (staff member's vest, main office, activity sites)
Execution: Named responsibility for carrying the action plan and medication during every activity
Measurement: Visual confirmation protocol: staff physically show the EpiPen location before each activity begins
You should expect to hear detailed explanations about medication management, not vague reassurances. Good schools don't just say "we'll keep the EpiPen with your child." They explain which staff member carries the backup, how they've practiced retrieval under pressure, and their exact protocol from recognition to injection to calling the ambulance.
Here's what I did that made all the difference: I asked them to demonstrate their EpiPen carrying system during the information night. Where will it be during the high ropes course? During swimming? During the night walk when it's dark and everyone's wearing jackets? These aren't difficult questions, but if they haven't thought through these scenarios, they're not ready yet.
I also insisted on meeting the teacher who would be directly responsible for my son's EpiPens. She showed me the bright orange bum bag she'd wear all three days, walked me through her action plan (which she'd laminated and read multiple times), and gave me her mobile number for direct contact. That conversation gave me more confidence than any permission form ever could.
Tip 3: Food Preparation Reveals Whether They Understand Cross-Contamination
This is where well-meaning teachers often stumble, not because they don't care, but because they genuinely don't understand what we deal with every single day.
Here's the strategic approach that exposes the reality of their food safety knowledge:
When to use it: During your meeting with the camp coordinator or classroom teacher
How to execute: Ask them to describe how they'll prepare your child's meal when everyone else is having scrambled eggs
What to expect: Detailed answers about separate surfaces, utensils, and timing of preparation
The coordinator should be able to immediately discuss: whether they use separate chopping boards and knives, how they prevent allergen transfer from other children's meals, who prepares the safe meal first before contaminated ingredients come out, and whether the camp kitchen has been specifically briefed on your child's allergens.
If you hear responses like "we'll just give them something else" or "the camp caters for allergies all the time," it's okay to push for specifics. You're not being difficult, you're being a good parent.
This matters beyond just meals because schools that understand cross-contamination in the kitchen understand it everywhere. They'll think about kids sharing sunscreen that contains almond oil, about checking ingredients in craft supplies, about hand washing before and after meals.
For my son's camp, I discovered the venue used shared fryers for all food. The school didn't know this until I asked: not because they were careless, but because they didn't know what questions to ask the venue.
Together, we arranged for his meals to be prepared completely separately, starting with clean equipment each time. That collaborative conversation made both of us feel better prepared.
Tip 4: Emergency Response Time Is Your Non-Negotiable Metric
I know how much you want to say yes to this camp. Your child is so excited. Their friends are going. You don't want them to miss out. But this is where we need to be eyes wide open about risk, even when it's uncomfortable.
Here's how this tip fixes the common gap of assuming proximity to medical care:
Current assumption: The school will handle any emergency appropriately
Key change: You verify exactly how long it takes to reach advanced medical care
New outcome: You know whether the location is appropriate for your child's risk level
Every camp venue is different. Some are 15 minutes from a hospital. Others are 90 minutes from a town with mobile reception.
For our children, this isn't about convenience. It's about whether there's enough time between adrenaline injection and advanced medical care. EpiPens buy you 20-30 minutes. After that, your child needs emergency treatment.
What helped me make this decision was asking these specific questions: How far to the nearest hospital? Is there mobile reception across the entire camp site? What's the backup plan if the main access road is blocked? Has the local ambulance service been notified about the camp dates and location?
When I learned my son's proposed camp was 75 minutes from emergency care with no mobile coverage in half the activity areas, I had an honest conversation with the school. We discussed whether this particular camp was appropriate for him, or whether he should attend the alternate coastal camp that was 20 minutes from a regional hospital. The school actually appreciated that I raised this early, and together we made the choice that let him participate safely. Sometimes protecting our kids means finding a different path to the same experience.
Tip 5: Staff Training Should Be Demonstrated, Not Just Documented
Parent information nights always mention that staff are trained in anaphylaxis management. I've learned to ask: what does that training actually look like when a child is struggling to breathe?
The reality is that a certificate from three years ago doesn't guarantee competent emergency response in a high-stress moment. What matters is asking for a practical demonstration of their action plan, and ensuring every adult attending camp, including parent volunteers, can recognise the signs of anaphylaxis and respond correctly.
I've seen schools where the classroom teacher was brilliant but the parent volunteer helping in the kitchen had never seen an EpiPen. I've seen camps where the coordinator knew the theory perfectly but couldn't describe the signs of anaphylaxis beyond "throat swelling."
These gaps aren't malicious, they're just gaps. And we can help close them by asking the right questions.
Here's what made the difference for us: I requested that the school demonstrate their anaphylaxis response during the information evening using my son's specific action plan.
I asked them to talk through recognition, retrieval, injection, and the emergency call. I watched how confident they were. I noticed whether they checked the expiry date, whether they knew which end of the EpiPen to use, whether they remembered to call the ambulance immediately.
The schools that welcomed this request were the schools that had genuinely prepared. And when I found gaps, we worked together to address them before camp. That collaborative approach, where I wasn't the anxious parent demanding perfection but a partner helping them get it right, made all the difference.
Making These Tips Work
Start with Tips 2 and 4. Understanding the medication management system and emergency response time will immediately tell you whether this particular camp can work for your child.
Here's what helped me cut through my anxiety and focus on what mattered: I wrote down every scenario that kept me awake at night. What if another child shares food? What if the EpiPen is in a backpack 100 meters away during an activity? What if symptoms appear at night when everyone's asleep? Then I asked the school specifically how they'd prevent and respond to each scenario.
I won't lie.
Sometimes the answers weren't good enough, and we had to have difficult conversations. But more often, I found teachers who genuinely cared and just needed guidance about what to ask and how to prepare. Many of them were grateful for the specificity because it helped them plan better for all the children in their care.
The most valuable tip on this list?
Tip 3, about food preparation and cross-contamination.
I've found that schools who truly understand kitchen safety understand allergy management holistically. They're the schools that think about hand washing stations after lunch, about checking ingredients in the soap at the camp bathroom, about the fact that some kids will forget and offer your child a bite of their sandwich during the bus trip home.
This journey is about more than paperwork and policies. It's about finding adults who genuinely understand that anaphylaxis doesn't pause for good intentions, and that being three hours from hospital means there's no room for error. That understanding or willingness to learn shows up in every answer they give you.
Look for the schools where teachers treat your questions as helpful rather than burdensome. Those are the camps where your child can have the same adventures as everyone else, with adults who are truly prepared to keep them safe. And when you find those teachers, tell them you appreciate their thoroughness. They're working hard to get this right for your child, and that partnership is what makes these experiences possible.