Student Choice Policy

Besides researching available alternatives to dissection – protect your right to refuse - ask your school board to pass a Student Choice Policy. (In Canada, currently Vancouver, British Columbia, Toronto, Ontario and South Shore, Nova Scotia have all passed student choice policies. Kelowna, British Columbia has passed a resolution about dissection.)

A Student Choice Policy is a written policy that notifies students in advance and protects their right to refuse to participate in animal dissections. The policy would also be written in handbooks and/or course outlines so students understand, in advance that they have a choice. Those who request a non-animal alternative are provided one, without hassle or jeopardizing their grade. See one young students' choice to write an essay for her "dissection" assignment!

Most teachers already agree that if dissection makes a student uncomfortable they can have an alternative such as a CD ROM virtual dissection. A Student Choice Policy puts that same information in writing to notify the student in advance of the dissection. After all a choice isn't a choice unless you know you have one!

Basic Sample of a Student Choice Policy

• Alternatives to dissection must be available in all classes for students who choose not to dissect animals (including insects).
• The responsibility for creating an alternative is the duty of the teacher, not the student.
• Requiring the student to watch others dissect an animal is not an alternative; the student must be allowed to leave the room while the dissection is taking place.
• Students will not be penalized or ostracized in any way for choosing the alternative exercise.
• A student’s choice to dissect or not to dissect shall be respected by all school faculties, and the student shall be treated in a non-judgmental manner. A student must feel free to choose an alternative to dissection without fear of being singled our or pressured.
• All students must be informed in writing (example – in student handbooks, course outline etc.) of their option to choose not to dissect at the beginning of each semester during which dissection is scheduled, a minimum of three weeks prior to the dissection.
• Those instructors who still teach dissection in their classes must verbally announce the policy to all students on the first day of the semester and on the day of the dissection.

Information courtesy of the National Anti-Vivisection Society