Be the Change You Wish to See in the World

     So, I'm taking a class called Leadership for Social Change this semester and it involves training shelter dogs in the Seguin community to help make them more adoptable.  Last Tuesday night a few of the women who work with the Animal Rescue Foundation (A.R.F.) came to talk with our class. They even brought their dogs and everything!
    One of the women, Barbara Upper, said something that made me think.  We were talking about how much they've helped to improve the Seguin Animal Shelter and she said that you get from your community what you tolerate.  A lot of the time we see things happening in our community that we think are awful, or we say, "Oh, that could never happen here."  But the truth is, they can.  And things will only change when we choose to change them.

Happily outside with Emily after his bath!

Sadly stuck in the shelter!

   
















     My friend Harlie and I ended up going to the animal shelter to see their facilities.  They were super crowded since their facilities are so small, and if there are too many dogs then they end up having to euthanize some of them.  That is, unless they can find foster homes.  This is where a lot of the work of A.R.F. comes in.
     These women have dedicated their lives to helping find homes for these animals, doing everything from placing dogs in temporary foster homes to driving halfway across the country to deliver dogs to the Hamptons, to holding monthly adoption drives at Seguin's Barky Park.
     On the day that we visited, we noticed that there were some dogs that really needed to get out of the shelter because they were literally going crazy from being stuck in such small cages with no chance to play or run.  Harlie ended up taking a dog named Tin Can to foster and I ended up fostering one as well.  Otis was brought in by his owner to be euthanized but the people at the shelter decided not to because he was so cute!  This story has a great ending though: it turns out though that my roommate Emily has been wanting a dog and she ended up adopting him just a few days later!
     It's still early in the semester, but I have to say that I'm absolutely pumped to be a part of this class.  Not only are we using positive reinforcement and clickers to train the dogs which obviously interests my psychology side, but we're also doing a lot of good for these animals.  I'm really looking forward to seeing where all of this will lead.