The Limestone District School Board (LDSB) is committed to creating a safe, accessible, and transparent system for submitting and investigating student human rights incidents and complaints.
The Student Human Rights Incident and Complaints mechanism will allow the board to monitor, track, and respond to human rights incidents and complaints that involve Limestone students in a fair, timely, and consistent manner, and ensure that appropriate response, resolution, and support are provided. This complaint mechanism consists of Administrative Procedure 376: Student Human Rights Incidents and Complaints and the Student Human Rights Incidents and Complaints form.
Students, parents, families, staff, and community members are encouraged to speak up when they experience or witness a human rights incident or have a complaint that involves a Limestone student. This includes incidents and complaints that are related to school activities or that occur off school property such as school-related field trips, extracurricular clubs or activities, and sporting events. Students, parents/families, or staff are encouraged to contact their teacher, supervisor, or school administrator to provide information about the incident or complaint. This is not a mandatory requirement. Students, parents/families, or staff can submit a human rights incident and complaint form without informing their teacher, supervisor, or school administrator. Where the incident involves the school administrator, then students, parents/families, or staff should submit a human rights incident and complaint form or contact their superintendent. The human rights incident and complaint form can be submitted anonymously, but we cannot provide feedback and follow-up if you do not include your contact information. LDSB employees who have knowledge of human rights incidents or complaints are required to inform their supervisor or school administrator as soon as reasonably possible and are encouraged to submit a human rights incident and complaint form. Additional requirements under other policies or regulations must also be followed. Incidents and complaints will be addressed in a timely, transparent, and confidential manner.
Students, parents/families, staff, and community members are encouraged to submit a human rights incident and complaint form for any of the following:
- Discrimination: Discrimination is an action or omission that treats someone unfairly by either imposing a burden on them or denying them a privilege, benefit, or opportunity enjoyed by others, because of their age, creed, colour, family status, gender identity or expression race, genetic characteristics or disability, marital status, national or ethnic origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, or any protected ground in the Ontario Human Rights Code. Discrimination also includes failure to accommodate.
- Bullying: Bullying is aggressive behaviour that is typically repeated over time. It is meant to cause harm, fear, distress, or create a negative environment for another person. Not all bullying is a human rights violation. You can submit an incident or complaint where it is also a violation of any protected ground under the Ontario Human Rights Code. Administrative Procedure 356: Bullying Prevention and Intervention should be followed where the bullying does not violate a protected ground under the Ontario Human Rights Code. Common types of bullying are:
- Verbal Bullying – such as name-calling, sarcasm, teasing, spreading rumours, threatening, and making negative references to one’s culture, ethnicity, disability, race, religion, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, and inappropriate sexual comments.
- Social Bullying – mobbing, scapegoating, excluding others from a group, humiliating others with public gestures, or graffiti intended to put others down.
- Physical Bullying – hitting, poking, pinching, chasing, shoving, coercing, destroying or stealing belongings, and inappropriate touching.
- Cyberbullying (Online Bullying) – bullying that takes place over digital devices like cell phones, computers, and tablets. Cyberbullying includes sending, posting, or sharing negative, harmful, false, personal, or mean content about someone else causing embarrassment or humiliation.
- Hate activities: Hate activities are incidents that occur in the school community expressing intolerance based on age, ancestry, colour, creed, disability, gender expression, gender identity, language, national or ethnic origin, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, or any protected characteristic. Hate incidents may take the form of intimidation, harassment, physical force or threats of physical force, verbal slurs accompanied by threats, vandalism of property, display of hate symbols, or messages implying that members of an identifiable group are to be despised, denied respect, and made subject to ill-treatment based on group affiliation.
What happens after you submit a complaint?
Your complaint will be sent by email to the Human Rights and Equity Officer, who monitors all complaints; and the principal or vice-principal of the school where the incident happened. If your complaint involves a principal, it will be sent to the superintendent who supervises the school. If your complaint involves a Superintendent, it will be sent to the Director of Education. It will be their job to investigate your complaint and contact you about the next steps. You can expect someone to contact you within two (2) business days, except on weekends or holidays, if you have given us your contact information.
You can learn more about the human rights investigation process by contacting your teacher, principal, vice-principal, superintendent, or the Human Rights and Equity Officer.