Should Emotional Support Animals be permitted on College Campuses?
The subject of permitting animals to assist students with disabilities in higher learning institutions has been a challenge in recent times. Ideally, for years, higher education institutions have allowed and accommodated the use of service animals to assist physically disabled students. However, the use of animals to help students with emotional disorders in higher education is a more current trend, which has brought new challenges. For instance, litigation cases for institutions with no-pet policies have increased, with students claiming that they require their emotional support animal to enhance their college life through reducing anxiety, depression, stress, and panic attack. As a result, higher education instructions have been in a dilemma concerning their commitment to renounce the existing no-pet policies for fear of facing disability discrimination charges. In these considerations, emotional support animals should be allowed in campus housing.
One of the reasons why higher learning institutions should allow emotional support animals in campus housing is that they have proved essential for students with mental disorders. Ideally, this justification has been supported by St. Mary’s College of Maryland director of residence life and associate dean, Joanne Goldwater. In her backing, the associate dean posited “having that animal has clearly helped to reduce stress and anxiety for some students … which helps them progress towards their degree” (Hoffman, 2015). In 2015, St. Mary’s College permitted the housing of emotional support animal following increased requests by students. Considerably, testimonies from two students – Ms. Brill and Ms. McCarthy underscore the benefits of these animals in their management of mental disorders. For instance, Ms. McCarthy who has a rabbit known has Carl as a comfort animal highlights that “When I feel a panic attack coming on, feeling his heartbeat helps me regulate my own” (Hoffman, 2015). On the other hand, allowing the housing of emotional animals prevent the higher institution from legal battle of being charged with disability discrimination. In the case study, the University of Nebraska was fined $140,000 by the Justice Department for denying two students support animals (Hoffman, 2015). Ideally, this case serves as a good example as to why higher learning institutions should embrace change and alter their no-pet rules to align to the changing times.
On contrast, those against the campus housing of emotional support animals claim that a student may bring a pet, even though he or she does not have a mental disability. Hoffman (2015) questions on how administrators can determine a student’s legitimate request for an emotional support animal and that of one who wants to bring in a pet for pleasure reasons. Ideally, this is a challenge for administrators as notable by a response from the Northern Arizona University’s director of disability resources who affirmed that some students attempt to bring in their pets as assistance animals while in reality, they do not have any mental disorder (Hoffman, 2015). Contextually, this questions the eligibility criterion for ascertaining that a student really requires emotional support from an animal.
The contrasting issues for allowing the campus housing of emotional support animals poses an ethical dilemma, which can be addressed by applying guidelines based on consequentialism. Contextually, consequentialism refers to the normative ethical theories that posit that the consequences of an individual conduct should act as the ultimate basis for judging the rightness or the wrongness of a conduct (Shafer-Landau, 2017). In this case, it will be appropriate to allow the in campus housing of emotional support animals. However, the existing policies on a student’s eligibility measure need to be modified to cater for the contrasting issues. I recommend a continuous assessment of the student should be conducted by the mental health care providers and a report filed to ascertain that the student really needs the support of a comfort animal. Subsequently, such a report should have a valid of six months upon which the student should go for a further checkup to ascertain if he or she still requires the use of the animal.