The Vancouver School Board recently cut about $18 million from its budget in order to make up for shortfall next year. (CBC)

A Vancouver parent says the recent school budget cuts are targeting special needs students in a discriminatory way, and she is joining others to take their fight to court.

Last week the board cut an estimated $18 million from its budget to make up for a funding shortfall for next year.

But Dawn Steele says those cuts will hit students like her son Sean, 17, harder than most.

Steele says the school board is disproportionately cutting services for special needs children and that amounts to discrimination.

"The only option that is left is for families to go to court," she told CBC News.

Her son Sean has autism and depends on a full-time teaching aid to help get him through half of his classes, said Steele.

But with the Vancouver School Board's budget cuts announced this week, that extra help could disappear in the fall.

Nearly 60 positions like consultants, specialists, speech and language pathologists and resource teachers were cut in the recent budget.

Steele says at time when the number of special needs students is rising, the cuts are unacceptable.

"These are the kids that have their formal diagnosis are up 35 per cent … and at the same time we've cut their direct supports by 25 per cent," said Steele.

Details of the legal action will be worked out in the fall, but Steele says she and other parents of special needs students will do what ever it takes to restore services for their children.

"Whatever avenue is most likely to produce a result, whether that's the school board, whether that's the ministry, whether that's a class-action suit, whether it's picking an individual child and having some sort of a representative action," said Steele.

The Vancouver School Board has blamed the budget cuts on provincial funding levels, while the education minister has blamed the school board for failing to properly plan for its financial future.