Stories of Exclusion
From Brick & Mortar to Online Learning
Conversations with BC Families About School Exclusion
Edited and compiled by Jenn Scharf, October 2021, J Scharf Consulting
The changes to DL schools will disproportionately affect students with disabilities and designations. Life is already difficult for us due to a societal system that doesn’t care to be inclusive to all.
Please don’t take away the few educational options that we do have for our children.
Jenn’s Note
All stories have been edited to remove any identifying information about families, districts and online learning schools. While this information was collected with every story, families were ensured that their identities would remain anonymous.
In addition, district and online learning school information was removed in order to focus on the larger collective story being told and to avoid any suggestion that these stories are specific to any one region of the province.
As the terminology has recently changed with the passing of Bill 8, the reader will notice various acronyms representing online learning experience. These include Independent Distributed Learning (IDL) and Distributed Learning (DL). These have been left as written in the story submissions, with an understanding that the new terminology of “online learning” and “online learning schools” applies to each.
Readers can review the tables following the stories, which contain lists of the districts families departed, online learning schools they joined, and a tally of the diagnoses that were shared throughout (though there was no request for families to disclose any diagnosis in the story submission form, meaning all diagnoses shared were at the discretion and upon the initiative of the individual families.
Jenn’s Introduction
These stories of school exclusion are shared by BC parents and guardians of children with disabilities who have transitioned from brick and mortar school to online learning due to reasons of exclusion.
They were collected as a special interest project by parent and education consultant, Jenn Scharf, as a way to make the experiences shared on social media more visible outside of parent support groups.
School exclusion comes in many forms, including:
● Denial of accurate information regarding student rights, policy, etc.
● Denial of access to school without documented incidents
● Lack of appropriate and/or necessary support
● Cutting support worker hours previously assigned to the child
● Being put on a reduced schedule
● The student not having regular support available
● Seclusion and/or restraint
● Relation, hostility or open aggression from school staff
Together, these 60 stories represent the very real experiences of families from districts1 across the province and with disabilities ranging from autism to cerebral palsy to giftedness. Each story is both unique, yet sharing common threads.
Together, the stories portray the challenges of brick and mortar schools, and the successes of BC’s online learning schools best known for serving disabled learners.
Jenn’s Acknowledgements
Thank you to the dozens of families who shared their stories. It is not easy for many to relive their experiences in writing. Your willingness to trust me in compiling and sharing such sensitive information is greatly appreciated.
Also, much appreciation to those who supported this process by providing feeding and proofreading, in particular Kyla Whitwell for her willingness to follow along behind my editing to catch any errors – your second set of eyes were invaluable.
Searchable List
Copies of the stories can be seen on this website:
Titles of the stories
Complete Report
The original version of the stories can be seen
on Jenn Scharf’s website:
Stories of Exclusion