This is not one of those sappy guide dog stories.  I learned new
information from this article, including how guide dogs for the blind
help others with disabilities in addition to those with blindness.  I am
pleased to see that the guide dog school with a $200 million endowment is
actually putting the money to work in high quality service.  A sidebar at
the end describes the cost of a guide dog.  It is more than the cost of
nine months of five days a week, eight hours a day of training at the
nation's best orientation centers for the blind, such as Blind Learning
In New Dimensions in Minneapolis and the Louisiana Center for the Blind.
Of course at these centers one learns    all the skills of blindness in
addition  to travel including Braille, home management, computer
literacy, home repair, and attitudes about blindness.

Kelly

Cincinnati Inquirer

Monday, October 22, 2001

Column writer gets new guide dog
California training program
brings 'Joni' into her world

Deborah Kendrick of Hyde Park writes the Alive and Well column in
Sunday's Tempo section. She has won many awards for stories and
columns about people with disabilities.

map SAN RAFAEL, Calif. - Out of the numbness that we all
experienced following the atrocities of Sept. 11, one of my own
first returns to routine was to come here to train with a new
guide dog.

For months now, I had been scheduled to return to Guide Dogs for
the Blind, the school that has trained dogs to guide blind people
safely throughout the United States and Canada since 1942. They
have trained dogs that have guided me since 1982 through every
major American city, countless small towns, amusement parks,
board rooms, the preschool circle times, high school football
games with my children and countless other places.

During a follow-up visit, I decided in June to retire my
11-year-old dog, Clarice, and schedule training with a new guide.

Despite experience, I was apprehensive about returning to school.
Flying just 10 days after the Sept. 11 tragedies brought some
measure of anxiety. Added to that was another more personal
concern. Could any dog measure up to Clarice, who I am keeping as
a pet? Interviews both face-to-face and on the telephone had
covered the details of my lifestyle, (a flexible and sometimes
frenetic schedule of activities), along with my personal
preferences in dog breeds and personalities.

The first 24 hours on Guide Dog campus was filled with lectures
and test walks, familiarizing ourselves with the dormitory, and
becoming acquainted with our instructors (two) and fellow
classmates. Training typically entails a 28-day stay at the
school. Our class,however, is an accelerated 13-day version,
offered to blind and visually impaired people who have trained
previously with guide dogs and who can't schedule an entire month
of training.

There were seven in my class, one man and six women, each with a
fascinating story and unique needs in a dog. Most students have
some usable vision; a few of us have none. Other than visual
impairment and previous use of a guide dog, we had little in
common. Yet, we instantly become a family of sorts, supporting
and reassuring one another, invested in the single solidarity of
learning to be safe and confident travelers with seven
individually matched dogs, selected for us by our trainers, Stacy
Burrow and Jenna Bullis.

Meeting Jonelle

Finally, we are gathered in the lounge for the moment we have
eagerly anticipated: Stacy's reading of "the list" - the names
and breeds of each of our dogs.

"You will be receiving a female Golden Retriever named Jonelle,"
Stacy reads when she comes to my name, and I return to my room to
await our introduction.

Jonelle greets me with a wagging tail and a gentle nudge of the
nose in my hand, eager to be loved, but not effusive. I see
immediately that she is a princess - and I am instantly in love.

The remainder of the day is spent heeling our dogs through the
corridors of the dormitory, teaching them to lie at our feet for
meals and generally becoming acquainted.

As seasoned guide dog handlers, we know the basics. But each dog
has a unique style, and, as young dogs, our new companions need
to learn to receive the commands they know from us, their new
blind handlers.

In our first obedience routine Monday morning, Jonelle was
perfect. On the first route in harness, however, she moved more
slowly than the rapid pace I wanted, and I tried not to be
discouraged. By Tuesday, she had already picked it up, and I was
elated anew at the thrill of striding swiftly, safely down a
crowded street while holding the harness handle of a smart dog
with a mission.

Throughout our two weeks, the schedule is relentless - beginning
at 6:45 a.m., ending at 9:30 p.m., with little or no spare time.
Besides doing obedience each morning, working routes throughout
downtown San Rafael and several areas of San Francisco, we have
scheduled times for grooming, relieving and feeding the dogs.
Most afternoons and evenings, Stacy and Jenna lecture on
everything from feeding and veterinary care to how to respond to
encounters with aggressive dogs.

We have lectures and subsequent practice working the dogs in
buildings, through city congestion, onto subway platforms, on and
off buses, up and down escalators and through obstacle courses of
traffic cones. We learn about coping with the distractions of
other animals and interfering humans, and how to correct errors
when the inevitable mistakes are made.

When humans and dogs alike perform admirably in our lesson called
"Working Sidewalkless Areas" in a quiet residential neighborhood,
we lobby for (and are surprised to get) a detour to Muir Woods,
the home of the tallest Redwoods in the world. There, Jonelle
trots proudly through the trees, pausing only when I ask her to,
so I can climb inside the hollow one to see what it's like.

Years of training

Jonelle, like her canine classmates, was a busy dog preparing for
her class with me. Bred by the Guide Dogs breeding program for
intelligence, friendliness and eagerness to please, she spent her
year being raised by two of the school's 1,200 volunteer puppy
raisers.

There, she learned her pretty manners and social skills. She was
taught obedience, house behavior, and was exposed to a variety of
environments.

After about a year, puppies return to the school and begin the
more complicated course of study: five months of learning to be a
Guide Dog.

Through repetition, patterning, constant praise and gentle
corrections, the dogs are taught to pull into the harness, to go
forward, left, right, inside or outside in response to verbal
commands and simple gestures. Trained to move in a continuous
straight line of travel until directed otherwise, they learn to
steer clear of obstacles, halt at stairs, and stop, awaiting
command, at every street crossing. Through repeated exposure and
lavish praise, they learn simple significant word associations
like escalator, elevator and stairs.

Although instructors are all sighted, they eventually wear
blindfolds while working every dog, to ensure the dog's
appropriateness for being matched with a blind person. With and
without blindfolds, Stacy and Jenna worked each of our dogs
before we came to class. Jonelle's primary trainer, however, was
Lani Dacosta, and by the second week, I was calling my dog "Joni"
as Lani told me she had done.

Magic and miracle

There is no magic in this process, but there is a decided
presence of miracle. One miracle, certainly, is the power of a
bond that can form between animal and human.

The last day was graduation, and the puppy raisers who provided
our dogs' first homes were invited to come and present our dogs
to us. My dog, I learned, was raised by two women - Sandra
McGettigan and Linda Maples of Tucson, Ariz.

A former airline pilot, Sandra was diagnosed with brain cancer in
1999, and was assisted by Tucson Puppy Raising leader, Linda
Maples in achieving her goal of "giving back." Two and a half
years ago, she says, she was given six months to live. She
attributed the extension of that sentence to the bond that was
formed in raising a sweet golden retriever to be a guide dog. "It
isn't easy to give her up," she tells me, "but I know she will be
a good dog for you."

After only two weeks of confident travel with this self-assured,
adoring canine, I know that Joni will indeed be a good dog for
me. As for the experience as a whole, Bob Phillips, president and
CEO executive director for Guide Dogs for the Blind, sums it up
well for all of us in his graduation remarks. "We have all shed
many tears since Sept. 11," he said. "It is wonderful today to
shed tears of joy."

E-mail [log in to unmask]

Cost of a guide dog

        Guide Dogs for the Blind depends on 280 employees and some 2,300
volunteers to accomplish its mission. Only 50 percent of all dogs
actually pass
the exacting criteria required for placement with a blind person. Those
who do not become Guide Dogs are supported in the school's active Career
Change
program or become part of the breeding program.

        While in training, all lodging and meals are provided for
students by the school. To make students as comfortable as possible
during their stay,
the dormitory covers all bases in offering creature comforts. A library
of Braille, large print and recorded books and magazines is available at
all times,
as is a computer room with state-of-the-art technology incorporating
screen-reading software, screen enlargement and a Braille embosser.

        For musicians, guitars and a piano offer respite, and for the
movie lover, a large collection of videos (many with video description)
are on hand.
An exercise gym (with all equipment labeled in Braille) is open at all
times - in the event that working dogs isn't enough activity.

        Dogs have been scrutinized by the onsite veterinary team for
every imaginable physical problem, have received all immunizations and
are sent home
with complete health histories. Even air fare to and from training is
handled by the school, as well as an offer of follow-up work at home
throughout the
life of the dog.

        The estimated cost of each successful working dog-person team is
between $35,000 and $40,000, but the blind student pays nothing. The
school is
funded entirely by private donations.

        For more information, contact: Guide Dogs for the Blind, Inc.,
P.O. Box 121500, San Rafael, CA 94915-1200; phone (800) 295-4050, or
visit them at
www.guidedogs.com.


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