Volunteering with animals for 12 year-olds in the SouthBay?

March 28, 2006

Hi folks,

I'm trying to develop resources for the kids I work with and I would love to see more kids working with animals. It helps the kids and the animals.

I know it's a long-shot, but does anyone know of any animal rescues, animal adoption programs, or any programs benefiting animals, that will take 12 year-old volunteers, in the San Jose/Santa Clara/Sunnyvale area?

If not 12 year-olds, are there any that will take teenagers? Or in other areas besides the South Bay?

Thanks in advance,

Melissa

March 29, 2006

Hello again,

I have this bad little habit of hitting the " Send " button before making sure my messages are clear. Sorry 'bout that.

I meant to say that I'm trying to find animal-related resources that are already out there for the kids I work with. (I'm a Social Worker). Volunteering is really good for kids and I think it would be even more beneficial for them to volunteer with animals for a myriad of reasons- teaching empathy, respect, kindness, it's therapeutic, etc. and the animals will benefit from it too. And of course I have the ulterior motive (that I wouldn't tell my co-workers) of hopefully making some future veg*ns

Also, Eric brought up some ideas of things that I have been hoping to get involved with. Eric said:

" I would suggest that whatever projects you seek to get the kids involved with, you should start them off with a good introduction to Humane Education (teaching compassion for all living beings in order to both protect animal welfare, and help children learn to be better, more compassionate global citizens). Can anyone out there suggest a good easy way to get started bringing Humane Ed to a group of kids? "

I think these are great ideas, so I'd like to see if there are others out there in the SouthBay, who would like to collaborate on something like this-something along the lines of what Nora is involved with-the Empathy Project www.empathyproject.org, which seems like such an incredible program (Nora, I hope you don't mind me mentioning your name.) (I don't have the intention of copying or duplicating this program, unless of course you'd like to expand it to the SouthBay.)

So, I'd love to collaborate with others to come up with some ideas for programs, curriculums, etc. to encourage kids to develop empathy and teach kindness towards animals, etc.

Please contact me if you have any interest in doing something like this.

Thanks,

Melissa

On 3/28/06, vegan4animals <

vegan4animals wrote:

Hi folks,

I'm trying to develop resources for the kids I work with and I would love to see more kids working with animals. It helps the kids and the animals.

I know it's a long-shot, but does anyone know of any animal rescues, animal adoption programs, or any programs benefiting animals, that will take 12 year-old volunteers, in the San Jose/Santa Clara/Sunnyvale area?

If not 12 year-olds, are there any that will take teenagers? Or in other areas besides the South Bay?

Thanks in advance,

Melissa