Animal-Loving High School Students: Are You Ready to Take the LEAP?
Would you or someone you know make a great LEAP student like Cammy (holding rescued lamb Ollie)? photo: Rancho Compasión
Are you a Bay Area teen who loves animals, or do you know a teen who is? Starting this month, three NorCal animal sanctuaries - Blackberry Creek Farm Animal Sanctuary (Placer County), Jameson Humane (Napa County), and Rancho Compasión (Marin County) - are launching a new youth scholarship program for high school students and they’re looking for applicants.
LEAP (Leaders for Ethics, Animals, and the Planet) will give Bay Area students hands-on experience with farmed animals and horses, a humane education, and the chance to earn a $500 scholarship by volunteering at one of the three sanctuaries and completing a four-month program. LEAP will encourage students to be compassionate catalysts for change by addressing three main topics: the ethics of using animals for industry, how to connect with and care for rescued farmed animals and horses, and devising solutions to curb climate change.
Kohana greets Snowball the chicken. photo: Robert Porter
LEAP is based on a program conceived at Blackberry Creek Farm Animal Sanctuary in 2017 by co-founder Danielle Hanosh. As told in Audori and Sebastian’s Story, the original student leadership program was named KEEPERS (Kindness, Ethics, Education, Philanthropy, Empowerment, Responsibility, and Sustainability) and was inspired by the bravery of a high school student named Audori. After participating in a traditional student agriculture program, Audori decided the kindest and most ethical thing she could do for her beloved pig, Sebastian, was to save him from slaughter and ensure he had the long, happy life he deserved. In turn, Sebastian’s story inspired other students to reach out, seeking sanctuary for the animals they had lovingly raised and the chance to continue to care for and learn about farmed animals while being directly involved in changing the way society views them. The original program also recognized the need to encompass leadership, responsibility, sustainability, and compassion, as does LEAP.
Students participating in LEAP will meet weekly, from February to June, for 10 hours per month at the closest participating animal sanctuary to care for rescued animals, assist with infrastructure projects, and attend humane education courses, all culminating in a community-based project related to the rescued animals. LEAP students will receive many of the same opportunities that other agricultural programs offer: collaboration with peers from around the region, participation in local events, learning from experts and mentors, financial compensation for their work, and spending time with the animals – but without the financial and emotional burden of raising and showing a slaughter-bound animal.
“Many students have a strong desire to work alongside animals, and predominant ag programs answer that desire - preparing young students for careers in the field of agriculture and providing access to hands-on animal experience, life and business skills, and even financial compensation. However, students who raise slaughter-bound animals are confronted with difficult and sometimes distressing experiences to complete these programs,” says Miyoko Schinner, founder of Rancho Compasión and co-founder of LEAP. “These other ag programs shame students who do not wish to slaughter their animal, whereas LEAP provides the solution to these outdated models by teaching students about kind care systems for animals in a supportive social-emotional learning environment.”
LEAP students will become adept at:
Public interface and networking
Group leadership and personal leadership (leading by example, and leading a life aligned with their ethics)
Problem solving
Practical hands-on skills at the sanctuary and in the office
Social-emotional learning and empathy
Participating students may be rewarded with financial compensation, letters of recommendation, and connections to a vast network of nonprofits and mentors. Families are not required to pay for feed, animal husbandry equipment, medical costs, or other expenses. The students will be paid fairly for their work, opening possibilities for a career path in animal rights and welfare.
As Monica Stevens, co-founder of Jameson Humane and LEAP explains, “We are excited to provide a different opportunity. It is high time. We regularly receive calls from students in ag programs who have lovingly cared for pigs, cows, sheep, and goats, and have come to the realization that they will be going to auction, to slaughter, and want to do what they can to save them. Jameson knows there is a more compassionate path for students who would like to work with and do better by the animals.”
Co-founder Hanosh underscores that premise. “LEAP encourages students that empathy for others is a strength, not a weakness,” she notes. “With humanity at a major crossroads, there’s no better time for our youth to leap forward into a more compassionate and forward-thinking society.”
Would you or someone you know make a great LEAP student? To apply or learn more about eligibility requirements and the application process, visit www.leapforanimals.org, or contact Maral Papakhian maral@jamesonhumane.org.