By Stephanie Vaccaro, Staff Writer
Last week a new program was launched at Johnson Park School in Princeton, one replete with doggie treats.
The therapy dog program, initiated by the school’s counselor, Robin Minden, is a pilot program designed to help students improve their reading skills.
Students meet with the counselor and her dog, Romy, an 8-year-old golden retriever, the for 20-minute sessions on a weekly basis.
Romy makes for a good audience. Her calm disposition, gentle breathing and dark eyes offer the students some reassurance as they read to her.
”I thought that this program would be a really nice combination of lots of passions that I have a passion for kids, a passion for reading and books, and a passion for dogs,” said Ms. Minden.
”Getting reading flourishing is really critical in the youngest ages,” said Ms. Minden. “So, we decided to take a look at 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade students. I had teachers nominate students that they thought would be appropriate based upon either very low reading scores, lack of focus or concentration, children who don’t have an opportunity to read at home.”
”For kids who are struggling readers, a lot of times they don’t want to read to other people because it’s very anxiety producing for them,” said Ms. Minden. “They’re constantly worried about how they sound, so reading for them is not an enjoyable experience because they’re constantly worried about messing up and being judged.
”And with the dog, you don’t have any of that. You have a dog really who’s nonjudgmental, a dog is not nagging at the reader to hurry up, there’s no push really to continue. The dog is not going to laugh if somebody messes up a word. So, all of those kinds of things that make struggling readers not want to read are not present.”
There are four children participating in the program.
”I think it’s really important that we don’t just make assumptions that reading is improving, but that we actually do assess to see that the growth is happening,” said Ms. Minden. “I don’t want to just offer a nice program, I want to offer an effective program.”
Ms. Minden said of Romy, “She’s the dog who always comes over and puts her head in your lap and always looks at you very empathically. All of that was turning around, and I was thinking, what could I do with this? Being a dog person and being a counselor, I have known quite a bit about therapy dogs and the use of therapy dogs in counseling and in lots of other settings.”
Romy went through a four-week training, which involved learning commands. Dogs must be willing to go with another person calmly, be able to deal with both children and adults, ruckus and chaos. They also have to be able to deal with people who might have dementia or children who might be rowdy.
Romy passed the test for Therapy Dogs International as well as qualifying for the K-9 Good Citizen Certificate from the American Kennel Club.
”That was like boot camp for Romy because she had been a family couch potato dog,” said Ms. Minden. “We needed to sharpen up her training a lot.”
”Therapy dogs can go into almost any kind of a setting,” said Ms. Minden. “So they could go into a school setting like this. They could go into a nursing home, if the nursing home wanted them there, or a hospital setting.”
”One of the things that’s really exciting to me is that this kind of a program a reading program with a therapy dog is research-proven,” said Ms. Minden, citing dramatically improved reading scores, decreased absenteeism, an overall improvement in report card grades and an increase in the use of the library as outcomes of the program in other schools.
Quite a lot of research has been done with regard to the use of therapy animals, said Ms. Minden. Blood pressure and signs of anxiety decrease in the presence of a calming animal.
”One role of a school counselor is to support the emotional, social, and academic growth of all students in our schools,” said Ms. Minden. “Typically we support academic growth indirectly through addressing social and emotional needs. In other words, academics improve when social and emotional needs are met. Some direct ways that we impact academics include chairing our Intervention and Referral Services Committee, running small groups about study skills and consulting with teachers, administration, and parents about students. The therapy dog reading program is another example of how this particular counselor has an opportunity to directly and positively impact academics. I think that’s pretty exciting!”
Ms. Minden is grateful for Principal Bob Ginsberg’s support of the program, from the moment she pitched the idea last spring to supporting the purchase of a range of books, all with dog-themes for the program after it received approval from the Board of Education.

