Four-Legged Friend

This semester, you may have noticed Rebecca Rauch ’11, a nursing major from Mount Wolf, Pa., on campus with a four-legged friend. She has a good reason for bringing him to York College. The dog, Heath, is a future Seeing Eye® dog from Morristown, N.J.

Until the dog is ready for training, it spends its time with a “foster family,” a family that gives the dog love, gentle guidance and consistent care.

“My family is a foster family for The Seeing Eye, the oldest existing dog guide school in the world,” she said. “We get the puppies when they are seven weeks old and teach them the basic commands, which are sit, rest, down and forward, until the dog is ready for training to be a Seeing Eye® dog.”

Her family takes the puppy to public places such as college campuses, malls, sporting events and work so that the animal can learn to socialize with people. When it’s time for the puppy to begin formal training, the dog returns to The Seeing Eye to learn to assist a visually impaired person in leading a more independent, fulfilling life.

“We keep the puppies until they are 18 months old, and then they return to The Seeing Eye for training to guide a visually impaired person through traffic and around obstacles,” Rauch said. “After 3 to 6 months of training they are placed with a visually impaired person and the pair goes through 4 to 6 weeks of training together.”

At the completion of the training, the dog goes home with the visually impaired person.