Please click here for a guide recently published by the Equality and Human Rights Commission to help businesses understand what they can do to meet their legal duties to assistance dog owners under the Equality Act 2010.
SCAS is seeking to appoint new Trustees to help drive its development over the next few years. SCAS’s Board of Trustees needs members with business skills, management experience and understanding of charities. Relevant professions currently not represented on the SCAS Board include social sciences, health and social care, web and digital development and medicine, including psychiatry and psychology. Trustees should ideally have relevant experience of the human-animal bond and must have an interest in this special bond and a commitment to the work of SCAS. Potential Trustees should have the drive and enthusiasm to take the charity forward.
Nominations for the Board need to be returned by the 1st March 2018. Elections will take place at the AGM on the 17th March 2018.
Click here for further details of how to apply and the nomination form.
Details of our next conference on 17 March 2018 are now available! Our focus for the conference is the important issue of Pets and Housing. We will explore the evidence and consider the latest findings as we look to raise awareness of how pets can enhance the health and wellbeing of tenants.
This event is free to SCAS members and £50 for non-members.
Call for expressions of interest to join a research group in Early Childhood Educational Anthrozoology (based at Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK)
The research group has a particular focus on developing connections between researchers who are looking at the ways in which;
and how;
Within the research group, a journal is being developed – the Journal of Early Childhood Educational Anthrozoology – which members are encouraged submit to.
If you would like to join the ECEA research group, please email ecea@ljmu.ac.uk in the first instance, with a brief synopsis of your research background and your interests as they relate to the focus of the research group.
Please share this information with others who might be interested in the group. There is a new page on Facebook ‘Early Childhood Educational Anthrozoology – ECEA – research group’
Masters student Kerry Townsend invites practitioners who deliver animal-assisted therapy (AAT) sessions to complete a brief (10-15 minute) online questionnaire.
This is a student research project, undertaken as an element of the MSc Occupational Therapy (pre-registration) degree at Sheffield Hallam University.
The study aims to survey the skills and activities worked on by people who practise AAT across the UK. The researcher is particularly interested in stroke rehabilitation, however it is not necessary for you to have prior knowledge or experience in stroke rehabilitation or occupational therapy to complete the questionnaire. Participation is entirely voluntary.
You will be contributing to research that hopes to inform the evidence base for AAT. The study is sponsored by Sheffield Hallam University and has been reviewed and approved by the Research Ethics Committee.
Please complete the questionnaire by 13th of September 2015 (date has been extended).
Questionnaire link: http://goo.gl/forms/zyfVTHKd1p
Any questions please contact Kerry Townsend, Kerry.L.Townsend@student.shu.ac.uk
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS – HAI RESEARCH
The WALTHAM® Human–Animal Interaction (HAI) Research Programme is pleased to announce the availability of £340,000 (approximately 524,000 USD) in 2015 to fund high quality research into the impact of companion animals on human cognition or academic outcomes.
Although animals are often included in educational settings for a variety of purposes, there is little empirical research documenting the efficacy of such practices. In the absence of an assessment system for these activities there are significant gaps in our understanding of the potential impact of animals on measures of academic success. Fundamental research is required to provide an evidence base to inform practice and guide educators and administrators on when, and under what circumstances, animal presence or animal ownership may be pedagogically valuable.
Specific areas of research eligible for funding under this call include but are not limited to the following categories:
Deadlines:
Letter of Intent: Prior to submitting a formal application, investigators are required to submit a Letter of Intent to Dr. Nancy Gee (nancy. gee@effem.com) by June 1, 2015.
Application: The application deadline is June 31, 2015.
Further details and the application can be downloaded from the WALTHAM
website:
http://www.waltham.com/waltham-research/other-funding-opportunities/
Dogs for the Disabled is seeking a full time AAI Services Development Adviser on a two year fixed term contract to lead the focused development of the charity’s Animal Assisted Intervention (AAI) services.
Specifically, the post will develop and implement detailed business plans, create the required staffing structures and ensure commercial opportunities within the charity’s wider operation are optimised.
Further information and a full job description is available from the Dogs for the Disabled website.
If you have any queries regarding this vacancy or want to discuss the role further, please e-mail Peter Gorbing, Chief Executive on peter.gorbing@dogsforthedisabled.org
This week, the BBC have been airing a new series looking at loneliness in Britain. James Martin takes celebrities back to a street they grew up on to see who lives there now and help set up a local social network in a campaign designed to tackle the issue of loneliness in the UK.
You can watch the episodes on BBC iPlayer. Tomorrow’s episode will be touching on how animals can help combat loneliness for some people. You can watch it at 9.15am tomorrow morning (Thursday 18th December) and the final episode is on Friday at the same time in the morning.
Watch Operation Meet the Street on BBC iPlayer
More information about the benefits of the human-animal bond can be found on the SCAS website. We’ve prepared a special page to signpost you to some of the most relevant parts of our website HERE.
The first International Conference on Animal Care (ICAC) Kobe was started in 2009, 15 years after the 1995 Kobe Earthquake (Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake) caused tragic human and animal suffering. Commemorating 20 years since the Kobe Earthquake, the 4th International Conference on All Creatures Care in KOBE 2015 will be held in July 2015. This conference aims to improve the welfare of animals all over the world by showing that our responsibilities extend far and wide within and beyond our society.
The ICAC KOBE 2015 programme includes a keynote, symposium, and reception, as well as a presentation by professionals and poster displays by graduate students.
The professional presentations (oral sessions) have four themes, including:
Food Safety/Zoonosis,
One Plan Approach ~Integrated Way to Live in Coexistence with Wild Animals~,
Education/Human-animal Relations,
Other.
ICAC are still accepting applications for the professional presentations and the poster displays.
ICAC KOBE 2015 Official Website
Announcing another free webinar from SCAS, this time presenting the Stroke and PAT project with Sallie Bollans from Stoke Rehab Dogs.
The webinar will take place on 15th September 2014 at 1pm (BST). If you would like to attend the live webinar please register here: REGISTER TO ATTEND WEBINAR.
The Stroke and PAT scheme is a
collaborative partnership between Ruth Winston Centre and the national charity Pets As Therapy.
It o ffers stroke survivors the opportunity to incorporate a companion animal into their stroke rehabilitation treatment programme. Pets As Therapy works in partnership with the lead professional Sallie Bollans of Stroke Rehab Dogs, to provide suitable volunteer PAT dog teams.
This free 45 minute webinar will offer an over-view of the project and the work that they do. Useful for anyone interested in how AAI can be used in an occupational therapy setting, those associated with stroke rehabilitation or an interest in these areas generally.
Recordings of previous webinars are available for viewing from our webinar series pages.