Assistance Dogs Of The West

Programs: Our foundation: 1 dog: 1 client in fy 2016-17, we placed two of our fully-trained assistance dogs to serve clients with disabilities, and an additional two dogs completed the owner self-training program. These four new assistance dogs mitigate their handlers disabilities in tailored ways for which they were specially trained. 1 dog: many people, courthouse and facility dogscourthouse facility dogs work in child advocacy centers, court appointed special advocates (casa) agencies and with judicial districts special victim advocates to assist children, teens and adults during traumatic criminal justice proceedings. In fy 2016-17, we placed nine courthouse facility dogs serving judicial districts based in the following cities: two in san francisco, ca; three in roswell, nm; two in los angeles, ca; one in fresno, ca; and one in austin, tx. Additionally, one facility dog was placed in taos, nm, with a clinical social worker who provides psychotherapy to teens and families. New and permanent home: adw training campus in february, 2017, adw moved from our long-term rented office space in santa fe to a much larger space which was renovated to meet our specific needs, to serve as our main training campus and headquarters. Located at 1590 san mateo lane in santa fe, adws new campus includes spacious indoor and outdoor training space; a kitchen in which to prepare the dogs nutritious meals and treats; more efficient office space to optimize administrative and trainer staff productivity; storage space; and even a dog exercise yard complete with agility course and dog swimming pool! This space reflects adw as a premier assistance dog training and placement organization, and allows for greater efficiency in training and administration. We continue our commitment to not kennel our dogs. All our dogs in training continue to live in trainers homes and with volunteer puppy raisers. Student trainer programscore to our organizations mission and training methodology, adw continues to operate the largest assistance dog student trainer program in the world. In fy 2016-17, we continued our weekly in-school student trainer programs, integrated into the educational curriculum, with our decades-long partners in santa fe at la mariposa montessori school and desert academy high school. Our after-school student trainer programs also continued to be held twice per week at full capacity as well, with youth ages 8-18 participating. Summer 2016 saw the third year of adws summer camp, a student trainer program where youth participate in a weekly, full day summer camp experience. Summer camp remains so popular that many youth signed up for two, three, even four weeks of camp over the summer, and there was a waiting list of others interested. We also continued to offer a weekly student trainer program to the high school students of the kiva program through santa fe public schools. Kiva, which stands for keeping independent visions alive, serves students ages 18-22 with developmental and intellectual disabilities, teaching them skills to increase their post-high school employability and independent living. We served 12 kiva students through the 2016-17 school year. All of our student trainer programs and summer camps are inclusive to students with disabilities, and those without disabilities, as well. We are proud of the friendships and community inclusion that result. Adw provides scholarships to student trainers in need, making this enriching opportunity available for all members of our community. Over 150 youth in santa fe were served by our student trainer programs in fy 2016-17. Adw youth boardadw offers the opportunity to exceptional student trainers to continue their leadership and volunteer service by serving as members of our youth board. Our fy 2016-17 youth board was made up of eight youth ages 11-17 years old. They each demonstrated commitment and passion to furthering adws mission through their organization and implementation of public outreach and education at events, fairs, and community businesses and organizations. The youth board is led by our executive director and instructor/trainer, linda milanesi, who instills work ethic and leadership skills in the youth board members. Many of our youth board members serve throughout their middle and high school years, and maintain close contact with adw throughout their college careers. Demonstrating these connections that student trainers form with adw over our 22-year history, we were pleased to hire a new full-time instructor/trainer, chloe davis-masters, in early 2017. Chloe began her connection with adw as a student trainer herself in 2001 at age 8 years old, and then convinced her parents to be volunteer puppy raisers. Chloe rejoined the adw family as staff after furthering her education in professional dog training. Santa fe teen courtsanta fe teen court is a nationally recognized early intervention and restorative justice program for teens between the ages of 12-17. It offers adolescents a second chance through a community based intervention/diversion program while also holding them accountable for their actions. In spring 2017, santa fe teen court became one of our newest partners. Adw works in tandem with teen court, embracing the mentality that empathy and compassion can aid in interrupting patterns of criminal behavior. Mentored by our executive director and instructor/trainer, linda milanesi, our youth board president brings our courthouse facility dogs-in-training to the court, to provide support and empathy for the teenager during the private interview process and to serve as a calming presence in the courtroom. Many of the participants of teen court have experienced trauma themselves and are at-risk for future risky behaviors; our program aims to break that cycle while the offenders are still youthful, by building empathy with humans and animals alike, decreasing the likelihood of future violence and offenses. Adw served approximately 30 youth in santa fe teen court in fy 2016-17. The warrior canine connection programsin fy 2016-17, we not only continued and expanded our warrior canine connection program in albuquerque, but began weekly wcc programs in rural taos, nm, and also at our headquarters in santa fe. The program engages service members with post-traumatic stress (pts), traumatic brain injury (tbi), and other challenges with reintegrating to civilian life, in training service dogs to be placed with other veterans with disabilities. Our wcc program began in 2014 in partnership with veterans court, serving justice-involved veterans; we have now opened the programs in all three northern new mexico locations to include all veterans, whether justice-involved or not. To date, over 30 veterans have been served by our wcc program, in addition to the three veterans who obtained assistance dogs, trained in part by those in the wcc program, to mitigate their own disabilities. Because of our success working with the veteran population, adw was accepted to lead a breakout session about wcc at the national association of drug court professionals vet court con annual conference, held july 9-12, 2017, at the gaylord convention center in washington, d. C. This educational session will be co-presented by adw leadership with the wcc-national team, and will be available to the over 5,000 conference participants from across the nation who work in the criminal justice and mental health/substance abuse treatment fields. Programs at our rural satellite in taos, nmadw continued its various student trainer programs at our rural satellite office in taos, about 1. 5 hours north of santa fe. In fy 2016-17, we offered weekly student trainer groups with local nonprofit partners in taos, serving at-risk populations of children, youth, and adults who have experienced trauma and/or homelessness. Our partners included rocky mountain youth corps learning lab, a service-learning based alternative school for at-risk middle and high school students; community against violence, the regions safe shelter for families experiencing domestic violence and sexual assault; not forgotten outreach, a veteran-led organization helping veterans; and, the new mexico division of vocational rehabilitation, which assists teens and adults with disabilities to increase their employability and independent living. In fy 2016, adw-taos served over 50 people in the local community through weekly student trainer programs: 12 youth at rmyc learning lab; 25 youth plus their mothers at community against violence; 11 military veterans; and hired 6 youth with disabilities ages 15-18 for a paid work experience program with nm division of vocational rehabilitation. Additionally, the youth student trainers of the work experience program worked with four university of new mexico pre-med students doing a rural rotation in taos focused on community health and disability inclusion to create a community education event open to the public. Hosted at the taos mesa brew