By: Ivan Wang

At the non-profit organization, Gabriel’s Angels, they provide pet therapy across the state of Arizona to children who need emotional support, due to factors like academic challenges, recent illnesses, or a traumatizing experience.

This organization is named after the owner’s deceased therapy dog, Gabriel. Founded in 2000, Gabriel’s Angels focuses on helping children between the ages of 6 to 18. School counselors at the schools partnered with the organization decide whether or not someone needs pet therapy, and if they do, they will have a session of up to 2 hours.

During these sessions, they focus on core strengths that are important for healthy human development. These qualities include: affiliation, attachment, awareness, confidence, respect, self-regulation, and tolerance. They practice these core strengths in many ways during the session. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, regular interactions with dogs help boost children’s confidence and self-esteem, along with bringing them joy and comfort. An example of this was when a dog named Lloyd kept on bringing the ball to a withdrawn teenage girl that wasn’t in the circle. Before, long that girl had a smile on her face.

Over the past year, more than 2100 children have participated in this program and have benefitted from the pet therapy sessions.
Currently Gabriel’s angel has 109 pet teams and 16 Helping Hands Volunteers. They have also partnered with 74 schools and nonprofits. Cara Kiggins, chief programs officer at Gabriel’s Angels says,“We’re the only organization that has partnerships with this many nonprofits and schools”.

Sources Used:https://kpcnotebook.scholastic.com/post/lending-helping-paw#main-content

Image Credit by bin Ziegler