Animal Rescue Foundation: Play Group Training Grant Report

How did this grant help your organization and the pets in your care?

Dogs Playing for Life mentorship training at Austin Pets Alive! Our executive director, Trevor Denham, was able to attend with the grant issued.

This grant gave our executive director better insight into playgroups and how to help increase the enrichment and socialization activities for our dogs at the shelter. The goal is to help increase their adoptability, and we feel the training he received was exceptional and will do just that.

How many pets did this grant help?

All of our dogs at the shelter will reap the benefits, so I'd say countless. We now have a set of skills that we can use as more dogs come in. It really is invaluable.

Please provide a story of one or more specific pets this grant helped.

We have a dog, Will, who was very anxious being in the shelter. He had lived outside all his life and wasn’t accustomed to being there. Because he was so rambunctious, we were reluctant to group him with other dogs. Our executive director took the skills he learned and was able to successfully let Will socialize with other dogs. As a result, Will now has a roommate at ARF and they get to play together during our shifts. It has helped Will tremendously.