Exhibit: Job at Four Paws Pet Grooming Center

Benchmark: Personal Management

Skills: P102: Demonstrate safety and self-control requiring minimum direction and supervision.

           

          At the beginning of my junior year I realized that I needed to start working more in order to do everything that I wanted to. I needed gas to be able to drive to and from school and also to be able to go to the barn and ride my horse. I have been trained by mom, who is an international gold medal winner in dog grooming, and I always worked summers with her. Aside from summers I tried to pick up as many hours as I could after school. But that fall I wasn’t able to get enough hours and make enough money to support my daily driving. So I got another job through one of my mom’s old students! Her name is Sue Clark and my mom had fully trained her and even sold her my mom’s old business, “Four Paws Pet Grooming”.

            When I started my job at Four Paws I was able to hit the ground running. I knew exactly what I needed to do and how to do it to the best of my ability. My main place was in washing and drying the dogs. Now as simple as that seems all dogs are different, some are perfect and sit still the whole time while others seem to think that it’s you that need the bath not them! After I wash the dogs then I have to dry them with a high velocity dryer. Basically what this is is it is a very powerful dryer that blows out the dog’s coat. It sheds out the undercoat and also blows out a lot of the water from the dogs’ fur. After I dry the dog with the high velocity dryer then I have to take a small handheld dryer and brush and comb through the coat and make sure everything is 100% dry. I could also put the dog next to a standing dryer that would blow warm air on them while I wash other dogs and just come back to brush them out later. Most of the dogs arrive in the morning so first thing I am slammed with roughly fifteen dogs they are everywhere and it seems like the cycle of wash, dry, wash, dry, is never going to end. And by the end of the day my co-worker Liz and I are usually covered in dog hair and soaked! Due to the training my mom put me through at her shop I was able to easily fit into the rhythm of Four Paws. My boss was very impressed with how little she had to help me. And also how well I got the dogs cleaned and how well they were dried and brushed out. I did not need any help when it came to working there and it was nice come in completely ready for my job.

            This experience made me realize that coming into a job prepared is extremely valuable. It only heightened my drive to go to college in order to prepare for my future career. In music therapy you will be working with a patient that have mental and physical disabilities and if something happens for example, a seizure you must know how to safely and effectively handle the situation.  I know that through college I will be setting myself up for a better adult life and career and I am grateful for this experience where I actually was previously trained and prepared. Through this I was able to apply what I learned and see how much it helped me.