Special Considerations – Secondary

Accommodations and Special Considerations
Identified Exceptional Students

If you have been identified by an Ontario School Board as being "exceptional" and in need of a special education program, you should have an Individualized Education Plan (IEP). The IEP, prepared by the school, outlines the accommodations you need in order to be successful. The ILC is prepared to provide these accommodations upon the receipt of required documentation (see below).

If you have not been identified as "exceptional" by a school board, you may still request special considerations from the ILC. You must support your request with documentation related to your disability from a qualified professional who is not a relative. A qualified professional may be:

• a medical doctor
• a psychiatrist or a qualified psychologist
• a teacher, a school guidance counselor, an administrator of a school, college or university
• a social worker

You may have documents from a previous school or a healthcare centre that recommend special considerations to support your request. These documents may be used instead of a letter from a qualified professional, if approved by the ILC's principal or principal's designate.

Here is some information to help you provide appropriate documentation to support your request for accommodation:

Documenting a Disability or Medical Condition

Documentation must be obtained from a certified and/or licensed professional who has specific training, expertise, and experience diagnosing the condition(s) related to the accommodation(s) you are requesting. For example, for a visual disability, an ophthalmology report is required; for a learning disability, a thorough psycho-educational assessment must be provided.

The documentation provided should also include:

• a description of the nature of the disability/condition
• a detailed explanation of the functional impact of the disability
• the length of time the student has been under the diagnostician's care
• any relevant test results
• supporting documentation if an existing diagnosis is being verified
• timelines for rehabilitation and recovery for temporary conditions; and
• identification of side-effects of any medications that may adversely affect academic performance.

Please note that a diagnosis alone is insufficient to support a request for academic accommodation.

Documentation should be dated, printed on official letterhead, and ideally, typed (for legibility). It should include the medical practitioner's name, title, phone/fax, mailing and email addresses and signature.

If you have further questions, please contact our guidance counsellor by calling the Student Enquiry Line or email ilc@tvo.org.

Possible Accommodations and Special Considerations

Here are examples of the individualized accommodations that the ILC can offer:

• giving students extra time to complete assignments or write tests
• allowing the use of certain learning tools, like calculators for completing numeracy tasks and computers for word processing, where possible
• administering tests individually or in small groups
• providing for the use of scribes for tests
• simplifying the language of instructions and questions used in tests

If you require an accommodation to complete your course, the necessary documentation must be submitted along with your Registration Form (PDF, 564 KB). All requests will be considered, although we may not be able to satisfy every request.

Students with visual impairments will asked to phone the ILC and speak with our guidance counsellor about the accommodation procedure.

Program Modifications

Modification of course expectations cannot be made at the ILC because of the manner in which distance education courses are delivered and in order to safeguard the integrity of the courses.

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