Facetime to Attend School
Eight year old Gabriel Dispenziere is a student who interacts with his peers and teachers using a web conferencing application and mobile device. He sits at a desk in his house and participates in the activities from a distance due to an extreme food allergy he experiences.
He isn’t allergic to just specific foods. He is allergic to all foods and any remnants on a person so he is unable to attend school or be around others that may have food particles on them. He cannot eat any food and is fed through a feeding tube at night. Gabriel is not able to be around anyone who has food on their hands, body or breath or he will have an allergic reaction due to his rare health condition.
Gabriel is very intelligent and skipped first grade. He is unable to attend school as he cannot risk being exposed to food particles on peers or airborne. But this year Gabriel has been to partially experience being part of a classroom for the first time due to the use of technology.
Gabriel has an iPad at his desk and there is an iPad mounted to a rolling stand in the classroom so that the students can see and interact with Gabriel as well as with his teacher. Gabriel and the students use Facetime to contact and interact with one another from a distance. He can now raise his face, participate in paired or group activities safely and securely from his iPad at home.
Gabriel was diagnosed at age two with eosinophilic esophagitis commonly known as EoE. It is a rare condition that causes the esophagus to inflame from allergic reactions to various food products. Unlike Gabriel, some are only allergic to a handful of foods but Gabriel is allergic to all food products.
With the recent addition of using Facetime, Gabriel is able to ‘attend’ school even though he has never been able to set foot in classroom or school building. If he leaves the house he has to be very cautious where he goes to avoid all food products. Gabriel is not allergic to sugar so he gets lollipops as treats and got cotton candy and snow cones on his birthday.
