For 18 years, I’ve worked as a middle and high school English teacher. In 2021, after spending 15 years at teaching at a charter school, I decided to move to a school that offered IB English. It was meant to be the next step in my career and the school where I would likely retire.

In September 2021, I was enjoying my first month and a half of work at the Calgary French and International School when the School implemented a COVID vaccine mandate enforced through termination for cause. I had until the end of October to “comply” or I would be put on “unpaid leave” and then fired 30 days later.

I applied for human rights accommodation on the basis of mental disability, which is a protected characteristic under the Alberta Human Rights Act. This included a letter of support and diagnosis from my psychologist which specified that I have anxiety around injections. My anxiety in this regard has meant that I do not receive any vaccines, not just the COVID vaccines.

The School denied my request for accommodation. As a result, I resigned my position before going through the humiliation of being fired for discriminatory reasons.

I submitted a human rights complaint, but, after sitting on it for two years the Alberta Human Rights Commission summarily dismissed my complaint as having no reasonable prospect of success. I am aware that the Commission has dismissed dozens of similar complaints.

I have decided to apply to the Court of King’s Bench for a judicial review of the Commission’s decision to summarily dismiss my complaint. I will be asking the Court to overturn the decision and direct the Human Rights Tribunal to hold a hearing for my complaint.

I have hired civil rights lawyer, James Kitchen to represent me. I am looking to raise $20,000 to cover the costs of the judicial review.

Mr. Kitchen’s rate is reasonable, but it takes a lot of work to hold the Commission fully accountable to the law. Losing my job at the Calgary French and International School resulted in financial struggles because I went without reliable work for most of the last 3 years.

I believe my case is important because during this period of vaccination mandates, employers did not consider individual cases of mental disability. How many times did I hear that everybody should be able to take this vaccine? It assumed that everyone would have the same reaction or same experience. When someone suffers from anxiety and PTSD around injections, this is not the time to dismiss them and cast them aside. It is the time to support them and allow them to keep their employment. Instead, the exclusion criteria for this vaccine were set at an unreasonable standard and when people submitted exemptions, these criteria did not allow for individual cases. This is an issue that the Human Rights Commission did not address, especially around accommodation. I feel that this issue needs to be addressed in society today because it is never too late to set things right and to honour those whose only request was to keep their employment without discrimination. Even more than this, by moving forward with a judicial review, I hope to reclaim what was lost in the year where mandates claimed jobs, lives, and businesses. The impact of that year is still being felt today. I feel this is something that should not be forgotten. It impacted not just me, but my family. Losing my livelihood in such a devastating way still impacts me today and likely will for the rest of my life.