Community Service Opportunities

Hello, dear volunteers!

I hope you're all doing well and staying safe and healthy, in between this virus and the storms! I wanted to let you all know that we do have a free course that you can take to be better trained and ready to work with shelter animals when we do open our doors to volunteers (and hopefully non-essential staff members like myself, haha) again. It's called Fear-Free, and it gives you an overview of body language to look out for in animals, helps you analyze how stressed or frightened an animal is, and teaches you ways to reduce their FAS (fear, anxiety, and stress; that's a Fear-Free term!)

Please feel free to count the time you spend on this as time spent volunteering. We consider it that important to your education as a volunteer here! You can track your time each session using our online volunteer form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScv7wfNwjGk9Bic-i6We4tvtF0iF-lH5TggBNdSpB9jVFrp9w/viewform?usp=sf_link

We feel that every volunteer and employee at the SPCA should undergo this training whenever possible, so even if you don't plan to work directly with the cats or dogs, please consider giving the training a shot. It's all done online and is a series of informational videos that you then prove your understanding of by answering some questions. Simple enough, right? And if you have problems, I'm right here for you to reach out to.

So to get started, download this form, fill it out with your information, then either take a picture of it or scan it so you can upload it to fearfreeshelters.com/register when they ask for proof that you're a volunteer. And enjoy the free course!

When you complete the course, please email your certificate to me so I can add it to your file and your badge that you are a Fear-Free certified volunteer! :)