Syracuse University junior Olivia Mance is a member of the Service Dogs for Syracuse Puppy Raising Club. Her pup in training, Taya, has already become a familiar sight on SU’s campus.

Mance recently began raising an assistant dog in training for Canine Companions for Independence, CCI. Taya is a Labrador Retriever and Golden Retriever mix and will undergo the first step of her training with Olivia. After this step is completed, the pup will continue along her path with CCI in the hopes of graduating the program to be placed with someone in need.

About 16 months from now, Taya will leave Syracuse to go to the Northeast Regional Headquarters in Medford on Long Island for six months of professional training. The last step in the service dog’s training is two weeks of Team Training, where she will be matched with a person with disabilities.

CCI is a national nonprofit organization based in Santa Rosa, California. It is the country’s largest provider of highly trained assistance dogs for children, adults and veterans with disabilities. The program is free to recipients, but it costs the organization about $50,000 to raise and train each dog.

Like Taya, the dogs are either Labrador Retrievers, Golden Retrievers or a cross between the two. By the end of the training program, the dogs know more than 40 advanced commands useful to a person with disabilities. Based on each dog’s specific strengths, they are then matched with a person with disabilities during Team Training at a regional headquarters. Only about four of 10 dogs make it through the training and graduate from the program.

From graduation, the dogs are placed in one of several locations. The organization offers different types of assistance dogs for hospitals, rehabilitation centers, criminal justice systems and veterans. Service dogs provide both emotional and physical support for people.

The organization also has an active veterans initiative that places their dogs with veterans with disabilities returning from wars. One of the veterans who received an assistance dog is an active-duty Marine who became a quadruple amputee after stepping on an IED in Afghanistan.

Several dogs have also been placed in the criminal justice system to comfort children who are victims of violent crimes as they give emotional testimony.

For trainers, graduation can be bittersweet. Diplomas are handed out to puppies and leashes are ceremoniously handed over from the puppy raiser to the new grad team. The puppy raisers describe it like watching your children go off to college: They are glad to see them succeed, but it’s hard to let them go.

John Bentzinger, a public relations and marketing coordinator for CCI, said watching the service animals positively impact people is rewarding.

“It isn’t easy, but when you see the tremendous difference the dog is making in the life of someone who really needs it, it makes it all worthwhile,” he said.

Published on December 5, 2017 at 10:01 pm