Education Policy
Laws, regulations, and governance decisions that shape the daily realities of students, families, and educators. This tag includes critical analysis of ministry directives, district implementation practices, funding structures, and systemic accountability mechanisms. It also traces the dissonance between policy ideals—such as inclusion, safety, and equity—and the actual experiences of those navigating the system, particularly disabled and neurodivergent students and their caregivers.
Inclusion BC is an excellent reference—particularly for a neurodiversity-affirming, disability justice–aligned perspective on education policy in British Columbia. Their work foregrounds the rights of disabled students and families, and they consistently critique systemic ableism, segregation, and policy failures in public education. They also engage directly with provincial ministries, making them both a watchdog and a thought leader.
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After Moore: why winning didn’t fix public education
When the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in favour of Jeffrey Moore and his family in 2012, affirming that meaningful access to public education was not a luxury but a legal right for disabled students, it seemed as though the tide had turned. The Court’s decision, rooted in the BC Human Rights Code and later…
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The promise of continuity when transitioning to a new school
Every September, education administrators assure families that the transition to middle or high school will be smooth, that each Individual Education Plan will follow the student like a guiding light through the unfamiliar corridors, that the new teachers will arrive prepared and informed. For parents of disabled or neurodivergent children, those assurances carry the weight…
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No accidents left to excuse
When I first read the Canary Collective’s Systemic Abuse in Education: Breaking the Cycle and Kim Block’s companion essay Is this Systemic Oppression or Systemic Abuse?, I did not feel revelation so much as recognition. I have called what happens to disabled and neurodivergent children in British Columbia’s schools abuse for years, because the word fits the scale…
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Bearing witness to truth
Every once in a while, a piece of writing crystallises what thousands of parents have been living for years — the quiet collapse of public education as a place of belonging for disabled children. Kim Block, Chair of BCEdAccess, has written such a piece. Her essay, published on October 18, 2025 and reprinted by the…
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Care and support for children with disabilities within the family
Children thrive when their caregivers thrive. The Special Rapporteur reminds us that the well-being of children with disabilities is bound to the well-being of their families—especially mothers, who carry most of the invisible labour. When schools fail to support families, they create conditions that push children toward exclusion or even institutionalisation. Families are often forced…
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Safety plans, billion-dollar scripts, and the harm they keep in place
When a parent hears the words safety plan, there is often a breath held in the chest — a brief hope that the school has recognised the reality of the child’s distress, that they have stepped back to consider what would truly help, that they are inviting the parent to build something together that will let…
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This isn’t a unique case, is it?
My children’s father said in a meeting: “Surely you’ve dealt with this before and you have a solution? This isn’t a unique case, is it?” The question hung in the air, simple and devastating, exposing in one breath the entire pretence on which school leadership rests. The question matters because it cuts through bureaucratic delay…
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Fraser Cascade School District (SD78): a neurodiversity-informed policy critique
The updated 2024 Code of Conduct for SD78 arrives in the context of a newly adopted Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion policy that promises proactive protection for students across multiple identity dimensions. At first glance, the Code carries forward much of the language from its 2017 predecessor—including commitments to prevention, fairness, and restorative practice—and now adds a new section…
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They keep moving the goalposts while our kids pay the price
It began with a phone call that felt like a lifeline. A new teacher was coming, they said, and maybe this would be the one to understand. We clung to that hope. We paid for another assessment, scheduled more therapy, spent weekends in waiting rooms and weekdays in meetings where the promise of change hovered…
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ADHD and autism aren’t phases
We don’t expect a wheelchair user to “earn” the right to walk by graduation. We don’t tell a student with diabetes that the goal is to get off insulin. And yet, in schools across our district, support for autistic and ADHD students is treated like a ladder they’re supposed to climb once and throw away…
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When the bell rings but the doors stay shut: why withholding recess is a breach of children’s rights
Few topics ignite as much debate as the cancellation of recess. Threads often begin with a frustrated parent describing how an entire class lost recess because of one student’s behaviour, or a teacher recounting the expectation to withhold outdoor play for incomplete work. Commenters share stories of children sitting silently at their desks while watching…
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Flourishing as an ethical imperative
Like many of you, I caught CBC’s Ideas episode the other day, where philosopher Angie Hobbs spoke about the ancient Greek concept of eudaimonia—a term sometimes translated as happiness or welfare, but more richly understood as human flourishing. In a world flooded by crisis, it may seem indulgent or impractical to contemplate the good life,…
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7 signs your child (or you) is being positioned as the problem to preserve the group
When a parent becomes too precise, too prepared, or too emotionally honest, the school system may cast them—or their child—as the problem. This essay outlines seven signs that scapegoating is being used to preserve group harmony at the cost of justice, with particular attention to how this dynamic unfolds in British Columbia public schools.
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The paperwork trap: when doing everything right becomes your downfall
When parents follow every rule, cite every policy, and document every meeting in the British Columbia public school system, they are often framed as adversaries, not allies. This essay explores how procedural knowledge becomes a liability, how the IEP process punishes fluency as threat, and why the most thorough advocates are the ones most likely…
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Collective punishment: how schools displace guilt, erase harm, and preserve the collective
One of the things that was so traumatising about the collective punishment that was callously perpetrated against my daughter was the light and evasive tone of the principal. She said that the punishment had to be “swift.” I frequently wondered about the choice to psychologically wound disabled children while treating the infliction of that wound…
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How schools weaponise growth against disabled students
In the architecture of public education, few concepts are more universally praised—or more fatally misunderstood—than independence. Cloaked in progressive language about agency, resilience, and growth, the independence mandate is often wielded less as a vision for liberation than as a strategy of withdrawal. For disabled students, particularly those who have learned to endure, mask, or…
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Shattered pathways of parent advocacy in BC’s public schools
It’s time to riot in the streets. We have tried everything else and our children are still being hurt. The existing systems of appeal and escalation are ineffective, more focused on preserving the institution than delivering justice. It’s time to end the engineered scarcity in our public education system. The maze of ineffective complaint avenues…
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Her body is still hungry: when growth delay is a response to institutional harm
Jeannie was born four pounds, a premature twin, and although her brother arrived even smaller at three pounds six ounces, he now weighs over 100 pounds. She does not. At nearly fourteen, Jeannie weighs 55 pounds and has been medically assessed as biologically eleven. Her growth has stalled, her energy is low, her development delayed—and…
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The afterlife of austerity
When public institutions are forced to survive under prolonged austerity, something deeper than budgets begins to break—something in the connective tissue of trust, of care, of the quiet, ordinary belief that systems exist to serve people. The myth of resilience—the comforting story we tell ourselves about teachers with hearts of gold and staff who always…
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Fierce is fair: when institutional tone policing meets legal obligation
There comes a moment when a parent begins to speak in plain terms, with no softening edge, no accommodating smile, no fear of being perceived as uncooperative. It’s when you realise that you won’t be liked, no matter how hard you try, because your advocacy positions you as inherently unlikable by schools with their current…
