Humane Alternatives to Dissection in Ontario Schools

In 1995, Voices for Animals, Kingston, Ontario and Waterloo-Wellington Alliance for Animals informed us that: "The Ontario Ministry of Education and Training has purchased license rights for five dissection simulation software programs [A Technological Dissection of: 1) The Frog 2) The Fetal Pig 3) The Earth Worm 4) The Crayfish and 5) The Perch]. Software, along with teacher and student guides were distributed to every school board in Ontario. Unfortunately, not all teachers are aware of these available alternatives."

WHAT YOU CAN DO: (Voices for Animals letter, June 13/95. Paraphrased.) Check (in writing preferably) whether the schools in your area are making this computer alternative to dissection available to their students. If you have any uncertainty about the alternative software programs being available, please write to the principal, the head of the science department and the head of the guidance department requesting that this alternative be made available as soon as possible.

Voices for Animals stated in their June 13/95 letter, "We have discovered that most science teachers haven't been told about the computer alternative. It takes a major effort by parents to get the computer program into the schools ..."

Follow-up to the above: May 1/96 ADLC sent letters to the Science Co-ordinators at: the Ottawa Board of Education and Ottawa Roman Catholic Separate School Board, both in Ottawa; the Carleton Board of Education and the Carleton Roman Catholic Separate School Board, Nepean, Ontario; Carleton Roman Catholic Separate School Board and the French Language School Board in Gloucester, Ontario; and a copy to Principals and Heads of the Guidance Department. We asked whether they included the computer alternative to animal dissection in the Course Calendar and whether teachers and students in biology courses have been made aware of it. We also asked about the possibility of placing a notice of these alternatives in their publication, and if their high schools are on the Internet so that we could communicate this non-animal dissection alternative to them. No response was received.

Write or call us to request our "Humane Alternatives to Dissection Package".