Learning Outcomes
Access means gaining entry and participating. The right to access education, free from discrimination, is enshrined in the Canadian constitution. In 1982, the Charter of Rights and Freedoms was introduced to our constitution. Section 15 of the Charter establishes these rights.
Every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law without discrimination and, in particular, without discrimination based on race, national or ethnic origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or physical disability. (s. 15. A. 1)
Gaining entry is not just about physical access, but about ensuring that people with disabilities have access to the activities, relationships and institutional structures within a service, including within education. All services in the province of Ontario, including education and early childhood education and care, are also subject to the Ontario Human Rights Code (OHRC), which enshrines the 鈥渄uty to accommodate鈥� and outlines protections for people with disabilities to be free from discrimination (HRC, 2016).
The specific experiences of exclusion in educational settings prompted the call for an accessibility standard that is focused on education. The Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA):
鈥淩ecogniz[es] the history of discrimination against persons with disabilities in Ontario, the purpose of this Act is to benefit all Ontarians by, (a) developing, implementing and enforcing accessibility standards in order to achieve accessibility for Ontarians with disabilities with respect to goods, services, facilities, accommodation, employment, buildings, structures and premises on or before January 1, 2025鈥�.
Yet exclusion in Ontario education continues and the education standard has yet to be implemented.
Accessibility is about more than compliance with legislation and policy. It is also important to understand the relationships and interdependencies that happen in early childhood education and care spaces. Radical access is a term that disabled scholars have coined to describe when there are relationships that lead to disabled people being able to come to a space with their full selves (Garde, 2022).
The three aims of these activities are:
References
- Sheldon, C. Tess; Spector, Karen R.; and Dhand, Ruby. The Supreme Court Law Review: Osgoode鈥檚 Annual Constitutional Cases Conference 115. (2024).
Page updated June 2026.