Man’s Best Friend and So Much More

By Shelly Aucoin|

Christy Bassett just might have the coolest job in the world. As Senior Trainer at NEADS in Princeton, MA, Christy spends her days training dogs to help the deaf and disabled.

“I’ve always wanted to work with animals, but knew that I didn’t want to become a vet or a groomer.  Originally I wanted to pursue a career with marine mammals but quickly found that jobs that work directly with those types of animals were few and far between.  I then started looking into guide dog training and eventually found NEADS, which was the closest assistance dog school of its kind to my college in Maine,” says Christy.

Christy completed an internship at NEADS after her junior year. “I fell in love with the dogs and the work that they did, and ultimately ended up being hired as a Trainer’s Apprentice after I graduated.  It has been 8 years now and I still really enjoy the dogs and believe in our mission,” she says with a smile.

Since 1976, the wonderful people at NEADS have been providing a variety of service dogs to people in need ~ most recently soldiers returning from Afghanistan. NEADS trains dogs in a variety of classifications including: hearing, walker, service, social, and specialty dogs, plus service dogs trained for the classroom, for ministry, and for therapy.

Happily, most of their hearing dogs are rescued from shelters. “I think my favorite part of the job is working with the shelter dogs.  There is just something about pulling a dog from a shelter and seeing something special in them that then translates to helping a person in need ~ very cool.  We do form a strong attachment to many of the dogs and most of the clients that we work with.  Being a part of such an important and valuable change in someone’s life is very rewarding.”

Chief Operating Officer Candi Hitchcock points out that there is also a “…weekend puppy raiser program for puppies that spend Monday through Friday in prisons. The puppies spend the weekends with families for additional socialization and exposure to different sights and sounds.”

For those of you interested in following Christy’s path, her major was Psychobiology with a minor in Animal Studies.

Check out www.neads.org for more information about the dogs and the programs at NEADS.