The first cohort of puppies in the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine’s Puppy University program will graduate on Thursday, Dec. 8 at 11:30 a.m. on the college’s Blacksburg campus, located at 245 Duck Pond Drive.
The veterinary college teamed up with Saint Francis Service Dogs, a Roanoke-based nonprofit, to raise three puppies for service dog training. Over the past year, the charter class of puppies — Koda, Esme, and Tucker — spent their weekdays at the veterinary college in a structured program of care where they learned foundational skills, such as walking on a leash or traveling on a bus.
The three puppies (including two Labrador retrievers and one golden retriever) each have a primary and secondary puppy raiser affiliated with the veterinary college and responsible for their care.
“We are raising them until they are about 14 months of age,” said Virginia Corrigan, an assistant professor in the veterinary school’s Small Animal Community Practice, who has raised Tucker with her husband Nick. “Then, Saint Francis takes them back and they do their full formal training, as well as more specific training for what they will actually be doing in their service dog work for a particular person.”
The program not only supports puppies on their path to become professionally trained service dogs, but also offers veterinary students important lessons on the human-animal bond. Veterinary student participants in the puppy raiser program have the option of earning course credit during their fourth year by completing a presentation about their work. In addition, six undergraduate work-study students have been engaged in the care and training of the puppies.
The graduation ceremony will take place in the college commons.
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