Schools are justifiably very concerned with the health and welfare of the children that attend the school. Imagine yourself being responsible for the safety and health of 1,000 or more children for eight hours a day five days a week. The necessity of safety often runs afoul of common sense, fear, and just plain human decency.

Federal law dictates that service animals are allowed in public schools and all public areas to provide help and assistance for people that have disabilities. Most people think of service animals as being strictly for the blind but service dogs have been trained to help people with a large range of disabilities including cerebral palsy.

One of the lifesaving benefits that a service animal can provide for a person with cerebral palsy is announcing that the person is having a seizure that could be life threatening. Some researchers have considered that the changes in body odor that precede a seizure tell the dog that a seizure is imminent before any human could detect the signs of a seizure.

This short video explains the hoops that the family of a boy with cerebral palsy had to jump through in order to allow a Pit Bull named Stevie to accompany his owner Anthony to school because the 7-year-old has cerebral palsy. The stink was based on the fear that a ferocious Pit Bull might attack other children despite the fact that the dog was constantly attached to the child’s wheelchair and was professionally certified to be a safe and friendly service dog.