Angel in disguise: dog in classroom

Angel in Disguise: Future guide dog attends GSCO with volunteer. Stephen Standridge

GSCO students may have noticed a new member to campus this semester with the presence of a guide dog on campus.

 Ashley Oglesby, a GSCO student, has become an active volunteer for the Guide Dog Foundation for the Blind, Inc. and since last April, has been a puppy walker for Angel, a purebred black Labrador retriever, and future guide dog for the blind.

Puppy walkers are people, like Oglesby, who get the dog after it is born and train it for the first year of its life. She said the whole point of puppy walkers is to teach the dog socialization. “Our goal is to get the puppy used to anything he or she might see as a guide dog. This includes all kinds of people from kids, adults, the elderly, and disabled people.”

 She went on to add that they get them used to being in different situations from riding a bus, to sitting in classrooms, to shopping in malls. Following the basic commands that normal dogs learn such as sit and stay, puppy walkers teach them more complex commands such as find the chair and find the elevator. “Basically anything that the dog’s handler would have to do, we have to be sure the dog has had a chance to experience it as a puppy,” said Oglesby.

 After the dog gets its full training, legally, there is no place the guide dog and the person receiving help cannot go. A puppy in training is also legally able to go anywhere a fully trained dog can go as well, but as a courtesy puppy walkers leave it up to the business owner’s discretion. Oglesby said only a few places have not allowed Angel to come in, even after showing her ID and explaining the program. “Some people just don’t understand what puppy walkers are doing,” she said, “but for the most part people are used to seeing these puppies in Athens and allow us to enter with no problems.”

 After the first year with the puppy walker, Oglesby will have to send Angel in for training in New York where Angel will get her more intense training and be matched with a blind person in need of a guide dog.

 Oglesby stated that while she knows Angel will make an amazing guide dog and help someone who needs her tremendously, she is dreading sending her in for training next April. “She’s been such a huge part of my life for the first six months,” she said, “and I know with the remaining six that I will grow to love her even more.”