Alliance Service Dogs

Alliance Service Dogs is finally launching services open to owner-trainers from outside our program! Until this time, all of our private lessons and group classes have been strictly reserved for students who have passed our assessment process in person. We’re so excited to be offering learning opportunities to new teams from the rest of Canada and beyond!

Tasking: Alert Behaviours for All Disabilities (June 16th, 6-8pm EST)

Our first virtual seminar is focused on alert behaviours. “All disabilities” casts a wide (and ambitious) net, but the core concepts of this seminar will apply to alert behaviours that can be used across a great variety of disability types. Expect 1 hour of theory, ~30 minutes of training time with live feedback, an extra 30 minutes of Q&A (optional), and access to the recording. Send us an email to register for a working or auditioning spot! **Working team registrations will be reviewed by Claire to ensure appropriate preparedness.**

SD Juniper (graduate) and SD Ruby (graduate & volunteer) - and their humans, of course 😉 - visited .fest this weekend! It sounds like it was a blast 💥 and we’re so excited that the disability community is getting an annual event of this size in Toronto 🥇

Congratulations to the latest group of teams to pass our Entrance Exam! SDIT Aurora ( ), SDIT Athena ( ) and SDIT Tairn have all recently passed the 12-week Trial Period required for new students with Alliance Service Dogs. The Entrance Exam is designed to ensure dogs are ready to continue service-specific training in more challenging environments, and these pups have proven they can wear the “In Training” vest with pride 💪🐾

We’re so excited to be running Public Access Field Trips again this summer! A jam-packed schedule awaits our current students, full of varied PA challenges including museum tours, street festivals, and major travel centres. Not a student? Stay tuned… we’ll be launching some training opportunities soon open to all 💫💕

Our advanced students (not all pictured) visited last week! We took the UP Express from the city to the airport, practised walking next to luggage carts and through crowds of people, pretended to “check in” for our flights, and did some aimless wandering around, so as to accurately recreate a true airport experience (getting lost and being tired and disoriented) 😂

SDIT Figment visits the hospital!

SDIT Tombo took on the hospital last week! He practised settling, getting comfortable in the public washroom, walking through busy hallways, and some of the obedience skills our service dogs learn.

Our public access group class met at last week! We visited the historical museum, several small shops, and ended with a coffee break at . Despite the dreary weather, all of the teams did super well and were very tired by the end of it!

This week in puppy class we worked on loose leash walking skills! Finding heel position and remaining with the handler while in motion are tricky but essential service dog skills that young dogs should learn at a young age for best results.

SDIT Lily practised her skills on the this week! She rode the train, worked on her loose leash walking and food avoidance, and was exhausted by the end of it 🥱 Great work team!!

Last week our Public Access group class took a trip to the beach! The dogs got a chance to run and play together, and the students practised their recall, leash walking along the boardwalk, and settling in a busy outdoor environment. 🌊🏖️ Thank you to our photo release-less student for the adorable group picture (you know who you are) 😉

Airport puppies!! SDITs Perry and Birdie visited to do some training this week, and crushed it as always ✈️🤠