The Waterloo Catholic District School Board is being taken to a human rights tribunal hearing over its handling of service dogs.
The specific case at issue is that of Kenner Fee – an eight-year-old boy whose mother is a trustee with the board.
Fee was diagnosed with severe autism at the age of three.
In 2014, when he was in kindergarten, he was paired with a service dog named Ivy. After allowing Fee a period of time to bond with the dog, his parents asked the school board if the dog could start coming to school.
They say they were turned down, and haven’t been able to convince the board otherwise – which is why they’ve launched a human rights complaint.
Fee’s father says Ivy helps keep his son calm and gives him the confidence to interact with other people.
He says Kenner sometimes acts out in school and believes that behaviour keeps other students away from him.
“My son, when he comes home from school at night, cries because other kids perceive him to be a monster,” Craig Fee says.
“It’s heartbreaking. He comes home at night and it all comes tumbling out of him.”
The Fees see they have provided the board with medical notes and other documentation backing up the effect Ivy has on Kenner.
The school board argues, as it has in the past, that its schools are private places and therefore not bound by laws granting service dogs access to public spaces.
Loreena Notton, the board’s director of education, says she can’t talk about specific cases.
In general, she says, the board has a “philosophy of inclusion” that can be an “evolving process” for some students.
“When it comes to student needs, each one is considered on a case-by-case basis,” she says.
The human rights hearing on the issue began Tuesday in Waterloo and continues on Wednesday.
With reporting by Mary Cranston
