Canine Assistants on CBS Evening News

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Originally Posted by rabernet

Did I mention I love this organization? :D

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i can see why!!! http://i182.photobucket.com/albums/x...ment.php-2.gif

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Originally Posted by recycling goddess

thank you so much for taking the time to answer their questions... only one more is asked from your answers:

how do you not fall totally in love with them and not want to let them go?

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Before they changed things around and tried not to have us have the same dog go home with us over and over, I fell head over heels in love with a dog named Tango, I called him Tango Mango Man. He and I completely bonded - he flew home with me (they get to ride in the main cabin), he went on road trips with me, he went to work with me, he was my bud. I got to present him to his recipient, but I hear that he didn't completely bond with his recipient for close to a year. It was the hardest thing I had to do during training camp (two weeks for the recipients) when I had to completely ignore him and turn my back on him while they were doing their umbilical cord work (no one can pet, feed or speak to the dog except their partner, to build their bond).

Now I know when I take them back that I still get to see them, and that there's another one that I will fall in love with the next time I take one home. It really does get easier when you focus on the recipients and the fact that they are the REAL reason why we do this. Seeing how they change lives is all the reward we need.

We all have our favorites, and Tango is definitely my heart dog. He's been in his partnership for 5 years now.

oh that must have been so hard on the dog as well. my heart goes out to you both. :hug:

I was just going through the other links that you posted, and Canine Assistants is truly amazing!! That is really rewarding work and I will have to look into seeing if there are any similar organizations nearby that I could possibly volunteer at someday.

I do have a few questions though. I was wondering how the pups' training goes? I know you said and the article also said that ya'll begin training even before they open their eyes by handling and all, and I am sure that they all learn a lot of similar basics, but once they get a little more advanced in their training, do the dogs continue to learn the same stuff or are they paired up with a person long before and have training schedules tailored to the persons needs? (I hope that makes sense..) And when you take one home, I am sure that you do reinforcement training, but do you also have to stick to a sort of schedule while the dog is in your home or is the whole thing more about socialization and allowing the dog to build upon an array of different experiences?

I just think that it is really great what you do and what Canine Assistants does..... I can only imagine that it is truly rewarding!!!

Pamela,

When the dogs are ready to be placed, they know over 90 commands. We try to do what we refer to as "brain training". We like our dogs to actually think for themselves, not just be robots. For example, I can remember Prancer's trainer falling down in the middle of the training room floor (part of the training) and telling Prancer "get help!". You could actually see Prancer thinking - she flew across the room, grabbed a jar of peanut butter and brought it back to her and presented it to her as if to say "this always makes ME feel better!"

The dogs live at Canine Assistants (in the CBS clip, you could see in the background with the founder - all the horses, and the farm buildings - that's part of our property). The dogs are exposed to the wildlife there (squirrels, birds, etc) as well as horses, cats, pigs, goats, donkeys, rabbits. The last thing we want is a dog that is tied to a child's wheelchair to decide to chase a squirrel, so being previously exposed to all that helps.

So there are 8 staff trainers. The dogs are trained every single day by the staff, then when they feel they are ready, they'll be assigned to one of the 5 recipient camps we have each year. All the recipients meet all the dogs and write down their top 3 choices. The trainers then match the dogs based on how well the personalities match (for example, you can't have an extremely outgoing dominant dog with a shy, diminutive person).

The recipients are assigned their dogs on the second day, and then they have 12 days before graduation that they work with their dogs. They get to take their dogs back to the hotel with them on the fourth day, and the dogs never leave them from that point on.

Most of the recipients can use all the commands that the dogs are trained for, some teach them more (one gentleman had his dog help him make his bed, another lady taught hers to flush the toilet for example).

In MY home, there's really not a schedule. There is a level of expectation though. I expect when I ask them to do something, that they do it. You can't ask them to sit, and let them just stand there and grin at you but not sit. Dogs are the worlds best gamblers. If they can get away with it once, they'll try again and again and again to get away with it again - they love low odds, as long as their are odds.

I can usually tell when another volunteer has let them break the rules (like allowing them on furniture - we are not to let them, as not all recipients are going to want their dogs on their furniture - it's up to the recipient to decide, not for us to get the dogs to expect to be allowed on it). You can always tell the dogs that have been allowed to before - they drive you nuts trying to sneak on the bed or the sofa.

So, basically, they are on my routine. If I need to run errands, they go with me. I do try to take them and my dog to this local school that has a fenced in area to let them run and play and just be dogs. Jennifer Arnold (the founder) believes that the dogs should always have some time to be allowed to just be a dog. Plus, it burns some of their energy off, so they'll be more focused when they are out with me. They really do know when their packs go on that it's time to work. They carry themselves more proudly!

OK, I'm rambling!

Wow! Just Wow. :sunny:

i love your rambling!!!

That's very cool that you work with them!
Being legally blind and attending a blind/multi-handicapped school from 7th to 12th grade I know many people who have guide dogs as well as various other types of service dogs.

I've had the privilege of being able to observe some of the various types of training that these dogs go through and I must say, Kudos to the trainers!!!!!! :clap:
They work their tails off (all puns intended) to not only screen for the best possible dog(s) for the programs and training ability but the hours of unselfish attention and hard work they put in simply for the purpose of providing a top notch "aid" for disabled people is beyond just note worthy.

IMO, service dogs are heroes, but without those who work with them day in and day out, they would just be... well... dogs; so there are two heroes in that boat!

Thank you for answering my questions!! I was looking through some of the graduation videos..... all those smiles on everyone's faces. It's so great!! It's no wonder that there are no dry eyes in the place, from seeing everyone so happy and thankful to having to see precious dogs going with their new owners, and to know all the hard work and dedication that was given to accomplish that!! Really awesome!!

And I didn't see it as rambling... :) :)

Thank you again and Kudos to the dedication that you show!!!

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Originally Posted by Shadowspider

IMO, service dogs are heroes, but without those who work with them day in and day out, they would just be... well... dogs; so there are two heroes in that boat!

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Aww, thank you! Jennifer, the founder - is OUR hero! Someone else PM'd me asking more about the program this evening, and this tells you a little bit about how selective Canine Assistants is with their volunteers too. Only those most decidated to this work ever graduate to Certified Volunteer Trainer. They ask a lot of your time and dedication, and many don't complete the training. We are required to volunteer 2 hours a month, take one class a year, and do three presentations or educational events or fund raisers a year. If you do not meet those minimum requirements, you have to become re-certified. And it's NOT an easy test as you'll see below. Here's what I wrote earlier:

Canine Assistants is a non-profit organization. All of our money comes from donations and fund-raisers. Milkbone is one of our sponsors.

I got involved when I worked with Nortel Networks, who encouraged volunteerism, gave us 32 paid hours a year to volunteer (so you could do a day event, for example, and be paid for it). They also had a volunteer "fair" one day where they had different charitable organizations come talk to us about volunteer opportunities within their organization. Canine Assistants was there, and I've alway had a great passion for animals, so it was a perfect fit for me.

I had to go through 10 weeks of 2 hour a week classes (every Sunday evening) and then I had to take a take home written exam and pass a hands on test with one of the dogs to see if we knew commands and how to handle different situations.

We have changed the program now where there are four levels of volunteering. You first have classes, then you have your written exam. Then you have to clean crates and the facility a few hours a week. Then you get to bathe dogs for a few hours a week. After that, you can go out on weekly outings (usually out to dinner, or a movie, or shopping) supervised by a trainer. After a few months of that, you get to take the Certified Volunteer Trainer exam which is another test with the dog (mine was in Walmart with a dog they intentionally trained to misbehave, and people planted throughout the store trying to distract the dog by encouraging it to jump on them, to kids with crackers in their hands waving it in the dog's face, all while I was in an electric wheelchair - to better appreciate the challenges our recipients face each day).

Now we are assigned trainers, and we rotate every three months to a different trainer. Each staff trainer has their own group of dogs (usually about 15-20 dogs per trainer). They'll sometimes ask us if we can take dogs while they are out of town (take, meaning, they stay with us for the entire week, go to work with us, etc).

So, basically our role is a support role to the trainers. We reinforce commands the dogs learned at the facility with real life applications of those commands. We only use the commands the trainer specifies. So, a trainer might have a younger dog that hasn't learned advanced commands yet, and they only want us to practice basic commands, like sit, stay, car, let's go, wait, leave it, shake, better hurry (potty command), etc.

Hope that answered some of your questions. Canine Assistants is in Alpharetta, GA. There are other service dog training programs (although not Canine Assistants) all around the country.