TREAT HARVEY, Director of Development

Last Friday I was distracted by the sound of happy children’s voices — squeals of joy, actually — emanating from the lobby.  Of course I had to see what was happening out there, so I peeked out.  There were at least 12 of our kids, huddled around something I couldn’t even see.  Michele said, Oh yes, that is Rudy the Service Dog.

Rudy and his trainer will now come to meet with our students every Friday so that our students can read to him.  The program, called Tail Waggin’ Tutors (promoted by Therapy Dogs International), allows youngsters who are nervous about their reading skills to become more relaxed about overcoming their fears while reading to a non-judgmental dog.  It sounds like we have a line-up of young readers who will be practicing their reading skills on Rudy again this week.  This is another excellent example of the Emily K leveraging existing top-notch resources in the community on behalf of our students. 

WRAL did a great story covering this piece of our Pioneer Scholars program.  Check out this link to learn more about two of our student (Ariel and Naida) working with Rudy.