Disability right to know
I am a collage instructor of a heavy industrial machine class I have to work with students with all kinds of accommodations and disabilities I see a lot of vets who got injured overseas It is an honor help people learn no matter what the disability is . Recently I have been told that we will have students with support dogs in our school. My issue is that we are not told at all what the dog is there for and what special circumstances might arise I am worried about the dog being a distraction for all the students especially in the lab. I understand the need for confidentiality however I feel unprepared to deal properly with this disability
Chuck,
I can't tell whether you are more worried about the students or about the dogs, but either way I think you may be worrying unnecessarily. Any time you have someone with a service dog in your classroom/lab with you, there is one very good question that you can ask as a springboard for further (if necessary) conversation. Ask "what service or task is the dog trained to do for you?" If the student asks why you want to know, you can simply explain that you want to make sure that you don't do anything in the class that would interfere with the dog's "responsibilities", and at the same time you want to make sure that the dog is not in any danger while in the class/lab. As to the issue of distraction -- the dog should be under the control of the user at all times. As such, it should NOT be engaged in activities that would distract for other students. We are not talking about small, restless little dogs who yap a lot -- we are talking about big, well-trained animals that should be able to be present without being intrusive.
Dr. Jane Jarrow
We had a vereran with a support dog on our shcool recently and this dog was an asset to the student and when there were labs with safety issues or noisy environemts, the sutdent would plan ahead and not have the dog exposed to safety/noise situations. If the student wished to reveal the nature of his disability, he would do so. as long as his accomodation plan was made available and the needs of the student are being addressed, the nature of his disability was not necessary to know.
Donald,
Exactly. People only have a "need to know" about the nature of the disability if they can or should do something differently because of that information. In the case you describe, that would not have been necessary.
Dr. Jane Jarrow
