Discussion assignment

Post1

I have been lucky enough to participate in many animal welfare webinars, seminars and conferences over the past few years.  With an ever changing field, it is so important to keep up with what is happening nationally and socially within the field.  

I was surpised by the example that Kristen Hassen used to describe how easy it is to make changes.  She used the example of how she used to never recycle, then making the necessary changes and significantly reducing her trash footprint.  Sometimes it is so easy to get caught in the small box of your field.  When hearing simple examples of change outside of the field, it helps you to remeber that change can be made by taking a few small steps.

I did not believe any of the myths to be true.  However,  a recent fact that is still very new to me is the idea of a finder being willing to take in the stray animal temporarily.  I can tell you that these practices have yet to reach Massachusetts, but I am going to make sure that this is part of my community outreach when opening my shelter here.  I think it is a great way to keep pets within the community and out of the shelter, but also showing trust between the organization and people of the community.  Having a trust built between the shelter and surrounding communites is going to be key to its success. 

No judgement is a change that is being made within the animal welfare field.  If you approach a person surrendering their pet with no judgement, you will have a better opportunity of getting as much information as possible regarding the pets history.  I love Kristen Hassens idea of offering an option to those surrendering their pets to be kept in contact with after the pets adoption.  As she said in the podcast, this would provide a "kinder world for people and animals". This is the direction we should be moving in to not only bond more with our surroudning communities but also keep pets out of the shelter as much as possible.

Post2

While listening to the podcast, I was really surprised by the way some shelters used to be and the old culture. When Hassen said that any animal or three years old or under four months old was immediately euthanized, I was shocked. I’ve volunteered with a few shelters and none of them were like this. I have kind of heard about when animal shelters were called “the pound” and they weren’t very clean or friendly looking, but I hadn’t expected it to be quite like that.

Something that I was wondering at first was what would be the benefit or reason to have dogs stay with the people who found them rather than just going to the shelter. Because my first thought was "isn't that what the shelter is there for - to take in stray animals?" But listening further and reading more about the HASS programing really helped me understand the need for this. It is better for the pets because they will still be in a loving home environment and are probably less likely to get sick. And this will help shelters be able to spend time, money, and resources in other areas that will benefit the community and their pets.

The myths presented were not things I had heard of before so that was new information for me. But one that stood out to me that I could understand why it would be believed is that “stray, healthy pets will be turned away from the shelter”. Learning about this new model, I wasn’t sure on all the details and I could see how it seems like this might be the case. But with all the information available on the HASS website, the initiative is pretty clear and explains this is not the case.

I think this information would need to be well presented and readily available to the community before these kinds of changes will stick. The myths vs. facts sheet is really helpful because it points out specifics of the programs that may be confusing at first review and clarifies them. That kind of education and communication with the community will be crucial.