A Calgary private school found to have discriminated against two Muslim students by not allowing them to pray is seeking to challenge the ruling at the Alberta Court of Appeal.
In August 2016, an Alberta judge fined the Webber Academy $26,000 when he upheld a decision by the Alberta Human Rights Commission that said the school unlawfully discriminated against the students.
The students, Sarmad Amir and Naman Siddiqui, were in Grades 9 and 10 when they were told in 2011 that their praying — which requires bowing and kneeling — was "too obvious" in a non-denominational school.
The boys, who told the human rights tribunal that praying is mandatory in their Sunni religion, continued to hold their prayers in secret in the school, or even outside in the snow.
"I had this intense sense of shame and humiliation, despite that I was just exercising my right as a Canadian citizen, as a human being, to practice my faith," Siddiqui testified before the tribunal.
But school founder Neil Webber argues that the school was purposely set up to be non-denominational and has a right to remain secular.
Webber says the school, which started in 1997, should have the same rights as private religious schools.
"Webber Academy is a non-denominational secular school welcoming students from many different cultures and backgrounds and we had established the policy of no space be provided on campus for prayers or other religious activities," Webber told The Calgary Eyeopener after the school lost its appeal of the human rights tribunal decision at the Court of Queen's Bench in August.
"We were wanting to separate the practice of religion from the provision of secular education and both the Alberta human rights tribunal and appeal judge don't agree with that."
When Justice Glen Poelman rejected the school's appeal in August, he did say the school deserved some credit.
"Webber Academy ... adopted a public policy of welcoming young people of many faiths and cultures, and to exemplify its policy, published photographs of students with turbans and facial hair even though these practices contravened usual school policies," Poelman wrote in the decision.
"For some reason, it drew the line at Sunni prayer rituals, conducted in private, in a place that was convenient to the school and the students from time to time."
