On Friday, 4 November 2022, the Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) committee of the University of Western Ontario (UWO)’s education faculty convened an “emergency” meeting. UWO’s teacher-training program had become an “unsafe” space, the assembled members were told, due to the “hate speech” being disseminated by a newly enrolled middle-aged student named Margaret Munn.

It’s uncertain who led the discussion. But whoever it was apparently spoke persuasively, as the committee resolved that Munn should be expelled from the London, Ontario-based university—a demand that was summarily communicated to Kathryn Hibbert (widely known among colleagues as “Kathy”), who then served as the Associate Dean for Teacher Education.

Hibbert, in turn, immediately emailed Munn—then a first-year Teacher Candidate in the faculty’s Junior/Intermediate program (which provides training for students preparing to teach grades four through 10)—summoning her to an “urgent meeting” on the following Monday.