Pets Alive: Build-A-Bear Youth Humane Education Grant Report

How did this grant help your organization and the pets in your care?

See below.

The program has not yet kicked off; however, based on early indications of families interested in the program for their children, there is high demand for this education. We anticipate more young visitors and volunteers at our shelter to help us care for the animals -- and raise their awareness of humane treatment of all animals.

How many pets did this grant help?

We anticipate it will benefit all our animals, or about 300 animals currently in our care.

Please provide a story of one or more specific pets this grant helped.

This grant was for expansion of our humane-education program. We are currently in Phase 1 of the project: creation of the expanded program, finding suitable space to hold the education sessions, and marketing/raising awareness. Our goal is to kick off the first session in early 2018. To date, we have spent $423 of the $3,045 awarded. We purchased $155 worth of books to be used with the children; we spent $20 on a poster to use at events to advertise the program and we kicked off our awareness campaign on October 7 at the Kidz Expo, an annual kids’ event sponsored by the Times Herald Record, the local newspaper, and attended by more than 2,000 people, mostly children and families. There, we had a poster that highlighted the humane-education program and had a sign-up sheet for those interested in the program and provided a flyer with basic information about it. More than two dozen families signed up. Since then, we’ve had sign-ups at our offsite adoptions and other events and have upwards of 50 families interested in the program. We have also identified several locations and guest educators to be part of the program so that we will be prepared to debut a pilot session in early 2018.