Weds 3rd Aug: Education opportunities

Although it might seems that dog rescue and rehoming is pretty much to do with taking in dogs and finding them new families, the fact is that behind all of that there is a huge amount of organisation and behind-the-scenes operational work to be done.  The few staff that we employ all have to multitask and take on whatever needs doing on top of their specified roles, while as much as possible is handled by volunteers.  They too work incredibly hard at whatever their particular assignment is whether it's Cindy handling all of the fostering, Jamie organising the "Game of Bones" gala, Vivian in charge of Peak to Fong and many others, and even the dog-walking volunteers without whom we just couldn't manage. 

In fact there is so much that has to be covered that goes way beyond individual job descriptions that I recently asked everyone to write down everything they were officially responsible for, and what they actually did.  Eva actually has two jobs in two locations, spending half the time at Tai Po and the other half in the office, and both are full time in themselves.  As it happened, long-term volunteer Sidney Mak had just let me know that he had retired from his career work and would be available to help out at HKDR, so he will be taking over some of Eva's roles and relieving her of at least some of the pressure she's constantly under. U Magazine added a new video.

14 June · Hong Kong · 

【1800天救狗日記】領養不棄養　照亮生命
　
光計去年，被人道毀滅的狗約有1500隻，其中有些狗狗身體健康，性格溫馴，牠們只因找不到一個家，就失去性命。救狗之家(HKDR)的出現，就是希望把小狗領養回來，盡力把牠們的性命延長，為牠們找一個家。若你喜歡狗，或可考慮以領養代替購買，即使環境不許可，也可到HKDR當義工帶狗...

Would you like this role?

Cactus is someone else who wears several hats at the same time, metaphorically speaking, as she is in charge of both education and training.  All HKDR adopters can rely on  full training support when and if needed, and that's just one of the many responsibilities covered by Cactus.  On the education side she is in charge of planning all of the workshops as well as handling group visits and talks, whether corporate or for young students.

After discussing which part of her job could be handed over to a volunteer, we agreed that the student talks would be an area that someone else could take up and this is how Cactus herself described what any potential candidate would need to have and be.  Is this you?  If you think it is and you are interested in helping on a volunteer basis (that is, unpaid) please contact Cactus at education@hongkongdogrescue.com for more details:

The volunteer will have to be very organised and have appropriate educational qualifications, possess good presentation skills, be bi-lingual and be available on weekdays. The role involves handling student interviews, so he/she must have basic knowledge of HKDR and dogs. The person also needs to coordinate with teachers, two Homing Centre staff and volunteers. This is an on-going programme, so commitment and being self-motivated is essential.. Usually people will be enthusiastic about delivering school talks for the first few times, but then the passion soon dies off.

Education to student groups

- Handle student or teacher enquiries and interviews.

- Promote, coordinate and conduct presentation for students from kindergarten to university, in the form of school talk and Homing Centre visit 

- Develop education materials 

- Develop children workshop with outside parties

If there is demand we can arrange this workshop in English

Details of the latest round of workshops were posted yesterday and the grooming workshop is already fully booked, so we will consider a second workshop to allow for demand.