ESA and Service Animals

Service Animals:

Some Rice students with disabilities utilize the services of trained dogs to directly assist them in daily life. Service animals are defined as dogs that are individually trained to do work or perform tasks for people with disabilities. Examples of such work or tasks include guiding people who are blind, alerting people who are deaf, pulling a wheelchair, alerting and protecting a person who is having a seizure, reminding a person with mental illness to take prescribed medications, calming a person with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) during an anxiety attack, or performing other duties. Service animals are working animals, not pets. The work or task a dog has been trained to provide must be directly related to the person’s disability. Dogs whose sole function is to provide comfort or emotional support do not qualify as service animals under the ADA.

Emotional Support Animal:

Under the Fair Housing Act (FHA) a person with a disability may keep an emotional support animal (ESA) in the individual’s dwelling when there is an established need for the therapeutic nature of the animal that is connected to the individual’s disability. An emotional support animal provides emotional support to persons with qualifying disabilities who have a disability-related need for such support.

A student interested in bringing an ESA into a residential setting will first complete the 3 step SDRC application process for accommodations.

  • If approved, the student will provide the SDRC with current veterinary records for the ESA.
  • At that point, the student will be sent a link to the ESA agreement form to complete.
  • Once complete, the agreement form is posted to the student’s file and shared with the Housing and Dining Office as well as the college coordinator.

Due to size constraints of Rice’s available housing options and the needs of other residents, Rice recommends that emotional support animals (ESAs):

  • Weigh no more than 50 pounds

  • Be at least 6 months old (dog, cat), housebroken, and finished teething

  • Be limited to one ESA per room/apartment, graduate housing unit

Rice individually evaluates all ESA requests using an interactive process.

For more information about Service Animals and ESAs on campus, please see Policy 402, Section IV B.