Walk into Pet Helpers Rescue and Adoption Shelter on any given afternoon and you’ll most likely be greeted by a smiling Sophia Shepp, who spends as much time there as a girl not on the payroll possibly could.

If you are looking for a purrfect kitty to take home to love, she can tell you all about it.

In fact, the vivacious 9-year-old pretty much knows the name of every cat at the shelter and – more importantly – their personalities. She can tell you just about everything there is to know about almost each and every one of them.

It’s not that she doesn’t have a house full of animals at home or doesn’t foster kittens until they are old enough to go to the shelter or spend her spare time raising money for the organization – because she does all that and more.

She simply has enough room in her heart for many, many animals.

Shepp is a volunteer at Pet Helpers and has been since she was 5 years old. Her mother supports her love for animals and takes her there at least once a week.

It’s her calling.

Katie Mehle, director of public relations at Pet Helpers, says supervised volunteers ages 12 and older can participate in all of the regular volunteer activities, which includes roles such as dog walking, grooming and cage cleaning.

Supervised kids younger than 12 can be “cat socializers.”

“Our cats need a lot of interactions with humans so they stay good adoptable kitties because animals that stay in shelters for a while sometimes don’t have the best habits with people because they end up shut in with lots of other animals,” Mehle says.

Kids can play with the cats, pet them and give them treats.

“We have cute little toys and laser pointers that they love to chase around the floor. That’s a favorite of the kids.”

This month, the organization will widen opportunities for young animal lovers to participate at the shelter through its junior volunteer program.

Junior volunteers will participate in a variety of activities including making dog treats and toys and humane education – learning what they can do to help animals in their community. They’ll also get to meet some of the shelter animals, with staff supervision.

“We’ve got some really kid-friendly cats and dogs for them to interact with,” Mehle says.

Pets in school

Lisa Trott’s fourth grade class at Ashley River Creative Arts Elementary School participates in the Pet Buddies Club, a program sponsored by the Charleston Animal Society, and has a special guest speaker and visitor once a month.

De Daltorio, humane education coordinator at the Charleston Animal Society, and Mac, a golden retriever therapy dog, visit classrooms throughout the tri-county every school day, reaching more than 900 elementary school students.

The program teaches students age-appropriate lessons about animals that follow state standards. Topics include pet care, responsibility, controlling the pet population, pet cruelty, safety around animals, choosing the right pet and the role of a shelter in the community. Daltorio gives out prizes for doing homework and correctly answering questions, plays games and shows videos – making the program fun for students.

Trott says sometimes her students are initially afraid of dogs, and she gives them the option to go to a different classroom throughout the time the dog is with the class. After a few visits, however, most kids lose their fear.

“They’re petting the dog and laying on the dog – not afraid at all.”

The class also learns about philanthropy by raising money for CAS, participating in the Santa Paws program – where they purchase gifts for a dog or cat and in February – and selling carnations and donating a portion of the proceeds to the SPCA. They also collect pet toys, towels and treats for Pet Parent Adoption Kits.

Members of the Pet Buddies Club are entitled to a Bark Scholarship, an acronym for “Be Aware Responsible Kind,” and can get their pets spayed or neutered for free if they otherwise can’t afford it.

Woof to Read is another program sponsored by the Charleston Animal Society. Volunteers and registered therapy dogs visit area schools once a week to help sharpen the skills of students who might be having trouble reading.

The program helps reluctant readers who might have anxiety about reading aloud to a group or to the teacher, including children with speech difficulties or learning disabilities and students learning English.

The process is simple – the child reads to the dog.

Daltorio says interacting with the dogs also results in psychological benefits. She has seen the students progress by leaps and bounds.

“They are relaxed have lower blood pressure. It’s a positive experience.”

Fostering

Both Pet Helpers and the Charleston Animal Society offer fostering programs for trained families willing to take animals into their homes and temporarily care for them until they can be adopted.

Occasionally they have a special-needs adult animal that needs fostering or babies younger than 8 weeks that need care until the shelter can take them.

“We send kittens as young as 4 weeks of age to foster, puppies 6 to 7 weeks of age. Also we will send nursing moms and her litter to foster,” says Danielle Lynch, rescue and foster coordinator at Charleston Animal Society. “The foster period can be anywhere from two weeks to two months depending on the situation.”

The organizations can provide some animal care supplies, such as formula and litter boxes.

Fostering is time-consuming and should be a family project – it isn’t an option for a child to take on alone, Mehle says.

“These puppies and kittens have needs that need to be attended to. They need to be bottle-fed every few hours.”

Mehle says it’s important to prepare children and have an open dialogue with them when deciding to foster an animal because it can be difficult to let go once attached.

“I think even adults have trouble with that. It’s difficult for us to give our love and energy to an animal we’re not going to keep.”

But no matter how much a family prepares, letting go of a foster animal can still be difficult.

“That’s not to say there won’t be some tears shed when the animal is going with the other family, but I think that is natural for animal lovers and people who care about cats and dogs. It can be bittersweet when you see an animal go from a foster home to its forever home.”

Shepp, who has fostered kittens with her mom and dad, says it can be hard sometimes to let go of the kittens that they’ve taken care of because they’ve gotten so attached. But she says she knows they will be happy with their new family.

When asked what she wants to be when she grows up, Shepp doesn’t hesitate to answer: a veterinarian. *