Humane Society

Submitted by James Richardson’s group

Huish, LisaMurri, NicolePalmer, Abbie

Richardson, James

Salt Lake Community CollegeCOMM 1010

November 12, 2014

Table of Contents

Title Page 1

Table of Contents 2

Executive Summary 3

Project description 4

Methods 5

Problem Question 5

Analysis of Problem 5

Criteria 9

Brainstorming Possible Solutions 10

Solution Analysis 11

Implementation of Solution 12

Conclusion 13

Works Cited 14

Appendices 16

Appendix 1: Team Contract 16

Appendix 2: Solutions Analysis Chart 18

Appendix 3: Statistic Charts 19

Executive Summary

This report summarizes how Haleigh Michel’s group intends to help the illiteracy of children, specifically in South Jordan, Utah, for our Group Communication Project. By using the Reflective-Thinking Sequence, our group was able to find the best way to promote literacy in children (Adler and Elmhorst, 2013, p. 236). We hope that our solution can help avoid future, negative results of illiteracy.

After using the Reflective- Thinking Sequence to find a plausible solution to our problem, we were able to fulfill the specific details of the project, explained in the Project Description. The Project Description will show what the group is set on accomplishing through this project. The Methods section explains the step-by-step process of the Reflective-Thinking Sequence we used to arrive at a solution. This includes many different areas of research that led the group to the best decision, including research of the history of illiteracy, characteristics of the problem, etc. Finally, in the conclusion, it is clear to see that the solution chosen is the best to improve the problem. If children read at home and begin to get excited about reading, literacy rates will go up. The group hopes to encourage this excitement through their solution. Additional information about our project and sources can be found at the end of this report in the Works Cited and Appendices.

Project Description

Animal Abuse is a major issue not only in Utah, but all over the world.  Individuals aren’t caring properly for their animals and the animals end up at the humane society.  However, the humane society often can’t hold all of the animals because of lack of money and food so more than half end up having to get euthanized.    We knew the best way to solve this problem would be for more responsible people to adopt the animals. We know that we can’t simply tell people to adopt an animal so we wanted to get individuals more aware about adoption and more aware about what is happening to animals in the world today.

Our group finds it important that animals are getting adopted. We knew that if people became more educated on animal abuse that is happening around them they would be more willing to adopt. We wanted to get posters and set them up around neighborhoods about animals that are at the humane society waiting to be adopted. Adoption can save an animal’s life and we know how important that is. Every animal deserves a good home with lots of care. If people knew about the animals at the humane society and if they knew more about abuse we believe more animals would get adopted. Therefore, saving more of their lives.

Methods

Our group began by creating a team contract (Appendix 1). This contract listed relational norms, task norms, relational roles, and task roles that our group put together in agreement. It also contained meeting times, contact information of each member, what was assigned to each of the members, and how our points are distributed. Created this contract created what to expect and it is meant to keep us on track. From here, we used John Dewey Reflective-Thinking Sequence to complete our project, which is a sequence process created by John Dewey more than 100 years ago (Adler and Elmhorst, 2013, p. 236). Basically it allows us to analyze our problem and come up with the best solution possible, using the acronym PAC-BOY. Below is each of the six steps we used to complete our project and a description of our end project.

Part I: Problem Question

While our group decided on a problem question, we kept in mind that our question should be realistic, open-ended, and did not state a solution in the question. After reviewing all our possibilities and ideas we came up with the best question that fit best.

Our group agreed that our problem question was: “How can we help abused animals?”

Part II: Analysis of Problem

A. Characteristics

1. Defining the Problem: Animals in Utah and all over the World are getting abused and neglected. In 1982 a study showed that in 88% of homes where children were being abused so were animals. No one knows exactly how many animals are abused each year. To many people animal abuse is just a minor problem. According to randomhistory.com "The Human Society of the United States reports that U.S. shelters receive 6-8 million cats and dogs each year. Approximately half of these are euthanized." No matter who is getting abused violence is and will always be violence. Animal abuse has gotten out of control. When an animal is abused the effects can last for a very long time after the abuse has happened.

2. Aspects of the Problem: Although it may seem like not many animals are being abused there is at least one animal abuse that occurs every hour in the U.S if not more. According to humanesociety.org "Neglect is not giving an animal the right food, water, shelter or vet care". Animal abuse is still going on whether people believe it or not. People are getting animals they can't care for or animals they refuse to take care of. Animal abuse is a serious problem.

3. Future Effects: Most individuals who abuse animals often suffer from their own form of emotional problems. Abusing animals can often lead people to abuse humans including their own family members. If animal abuse and neglect go on for long enough the animal will most likely end up dying or suffer from serious injuries. According to dosomething.org "Over 100 million animals – mice, rats, dogs, cats, rabbits, monkeys,

birds, among others – are killed in US laboratories for chemical, drug, food, and cosmetics testing every year." People need to be aware of animal abuse so it can be stopped. The more people are aware of what's going on the easier it will be to find good homes for those that have been abused. Adoption can save an animal’s life.

B. Stakeholders

1. Abused Animals: Abuse is a fighting issue that affects thousands of animals a year that need to be rescued. Since animals don’t have the voice to speak up for themselves, it makes it that much harder to find a voice that will stand up for them. Most cases are never reported, and most animal suffering goes unrecognized and unabated.

2. Animal Owners: Animal Owners are one of the most important keys in animal cruelty. Mainly because of the way they treat their animals, but how they choose to be as an animal owner. Children who are surrounded by animal cruelty are more likely to become abusers as well. 71% of domestic violence victims report that their abuser also targeted their animal (Ascione, 1997).

3. Animal Shelters: 6 to 8 million of cats and dogs enter animal shelters each year. Animal shelters are beginning to overflow with animals that are not being adopted and don’t know what to do with. With only about 30 percent of pets finding a home that came from shelters or rescues. The number of shelters has decreased over the years, from 12–20 million to an estimated 3–4 million. Some shelters, if the shelter euthanizes due to growing numbers of animals, on average, it costs approximately $100 to capture, house, and feed and eventually kill a homeless animal, a cost that ultimately comes out of the tax payers’ pockets. 3 to 4 million dogs and cats are killed every year because shelters are too full and there aren’t enough adoptive homes. Each year, approximately 2.7 million animals are euthanized because they do not get adopted.

4. Animal Rescue Teams: Rescuers are committed to the rescue, rehabilitation, and adoption of at-risk pets from pound facilities. With holidays coming they work tirelessly to get animals adopted to the right home free of cruelty and abuse. Rescuers are mostly all-volunteer groups and their sources of revenue are from adoption fees, tax-deductible donations, and fundraising efforts.

5. Society: Society as a whole is affected by animal Abuse. Because of the limited information spread about animal abuse, prevention, and solutions, as a whole, we are unable to help what we are not informed about. Furthermore,

C. History

Back In 1888, in a town called Tacoma, a drunken logger began kicking a bear. People witnessed it, and they had had enough with this animal cruelty. Thus began The Humane Society. Through the years, many solutions have been tried. Some have worked quite well. Others have not. “In the late 1800s, several Societies for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals had been established throughout the United States. But it was not until 1873, with the highly publicized story of Mary Ellen Wilson, that the first Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children was created.”Although these organizations met great successes throughout their existence, they lacked a unified voice in promoting the humane movement. So, four years later, delegates from 27 humane organizations from 10 states joined together in the first forum where they could combine their strength and unite their missions. It was at this meeting that the American Humane Association was founded, and it immediately began to address one of its first tasks -- to put an end to the inhumane treatment of farm animals and the deplorable conditions in which they were kept

1. Solutions used in the past: Adoption has always been a solution used in the past. It all began with the birth of the American Humane Society during the 1800’s, adoption was used as a solution. Another solution people have tried is to just merely play with the abused animals, but that only brings temporary happiness. Some people have even gone as far as euthanizing them to put them out of their misery. Sad, but true.

2. How well they have worked: Playing with abused animals is always a good option to help abused animals. It’s a nice no commitment way of showing animals that they are cared for. It’s only temporary so it is not as effective. Euthanizing is absolutely inhumane. It’s just the coward’s way out. But, there is one solution that gets the job done, Adoption. This solves the loneliness problem for the animals, is permanent, and doesn’t involve killing them. It’s a win-win-win situation.

3. Whom they have helped: The solution of playing with them helps both the animals and the people playing with them. However, it is only short lived. Euthanizing the abused animals ends the animal’s pain, but also their happiness. Adoption helps everyone. This solution has always helped the abused animals as well as brightening the lives of those who adopt them.

4. Whom they have hindered: Playing with animals doesn’t hinder anyone. Euthanizing them hinders both the animals and the people who have to do it. The only people adoption has ever hindered are those who were unable to take care of the abused animal.

5. How I know: I know these things from reading about them, and also from personal experiences. I have been a part of visiting abused animals and playing with them. I also have cousins who have adopted and I know it’s a great solution.

D. Policies/Politics

What regulations, professional requirements, political considerations, and/or ethical expectations might impact your solution?

1. Regulations: Regulations for doing this project will mainly entail just following the law. There are certain procedures that must be done in order to adopt an animal. However, the actual process of adoption isn’t included in our project. Our group is simply informing people about the option of adoption and trying to persuade people to save animals. There are no actual regulations that will impact the solution we’ve chosen.

2. Professional Requirements: There are no professional requirements needed in order to adopt an animal or even to advertise for adoption. Paperwork is required to be filled out in order to adopt, but no professional requirements. Therefore, professional requirements don’t impact our solution whatsoever.

3. Political Considerations: There are many political considerations that impact our solution. One of these include making sure what we’re doing is legal. There’s no law that prohibits getting word out about adoption, but making sure everything we do is legal is definitely important to our group. Another thing we want to consider is making sure we benefit the animals of the Humane Society.

4. Ethical Expectations: Ethical expectations of this project are that we will get the word out about abused animals and be successful in helping the animals.

E. Resources Available

1. Special Funds: As of 2010 the total amount of money available to improving literacy among individuals in K-12 schools, as provided by the U.S. Department of Education, was $19,145,000. This was the overall amount of funds allocated towards improving literacy through school libraries. These funds were separated into grant-based awards ranging from $30,000 to $500,000. Many of these “awards” were in the sum of $350,000 per award. In order to be eligible for these grants, schools must have at least 20 percent of its students come from families with incomes below the poverty line.

2. We decided that it would be a great idea to locate a local group who helps students and adults learn how to read and write. We found Kumon, a math and reading center (Kumon, 2013). Kumon’s after-school program helps children achieve success around the world. They strive to help children love learning. The focus of the program is individualized learning, so students advance through the programs at their own pace. Each child is monitored to ensure comprehension before moving on to new material. The Kumon Reading Program begins with basic phonics and progresses all the way through advanced reading comprehension. It is great to know that there are programs locally that are striving to end illiteracy.

Part III: Criteria

Criteria are an important part of the Reflective-Thinking Sequence. Criteria contribute to the starting of the brainstorming process. The criteria we established in this step are used in the Part V (Appendix 2). We first determined our general goal, and then suggested certain criteria that would best help accomplish our goal.

A. General Goal1. Our general goal is to make a difference by helping a certain group of in our society.

B. Specific Criteria1. Costs less than $52. Requires no more than two hours per person and time is spent effectively (Adler and

Elmhorst, 2013, p. 221) 3. Realistic 4. Safe5. Positive 6. Legal7. Applies communication techniques learned in class, such as using multiple channels

(Adler and Elmhorst, 2013, p. 13)

Part IV: Brainstorming Possible Solutions

The next step to find the best solution was to brainstorm as our possible solutions. We kept in mind that any solution was a possibility and it was important to not judge any ideas that came up. Each member contributed thoughts to this process by suggesting his or her own ideas. Below is the list of ideas we came up with.

A. Euthanize B. Adoption C. Donations D. Play with themE. Rent-A-PuppyF. Stay informedG. Fight for passage of strong anti-cruelty lawsH. Talk to kids about how to treat animals with kindness and respectI. Support local shelter or animal rescue organizationJ. Start a Neighborhood Watch ProgramK. VolunteerL. Become advocateM. Buy animal suppliesN. Collect toys

Part V: Solution Analysis

Our group was excited for this step because we finally got to decide on a solution to our problem. However, deciding on a single, best solution was harder than we thought. We first had to take our long list of possible solutions and narrow it down to the top five. In order to do this, each member was allowed to vote for four solutions. From there, we tallied up the votes and determined the five solutions that had the highest number of votes.

A. Narrowed List of Solutions1. Euthanize2. Adoption3. Donations4. Play with them5. Rent-A-Puppy

B. ChartTo better evaluate our top five solutions, our group made a chart (Appendix 2). We listed our narrowed down five solutions across the top of the chart, and then our criteria down the side. We ranked each solution based on how well we thought that met the criteria. We used a scale that was from zero to ten; zero meaning that the solution did not meet the criteria and ten meaning the solution met the criteria exactly.

C. Final SolutionIt was clear that all of our overall decision was that adoption had met the criteria the best, and that would be our final decision. Although adoption isn’t the cheapest it is the most humane, reasonable, positive and legal. It also included people to get involved, that animals should be adopted instead of bought at a store. This being said, adoption was our best solution. Therefore, each of us decided that over the long run adoption would be worth it.

D. Possible Negative Consequences After we decided on our solution and had time to process it, we found that there were some problems that we did not take in to account. There was the possibility that no teachers would have time for us to come visit, and there was also the possibility that the kids would be uninterested in our project. After much thought, we decided that these problems could be overcome in one way or another. Through personal networks (Adler and Elmhorst, 2013, p. 22) we were sure we could find a teacher who would be willing to help us. We also concluded that first graders would be easiest to keep entertained. We felt confident that we could continue on with our same solution.

Part VI: Implementation of SolutionThe next step was to put our ideas into action. Because of winter break and other problems that arose, our group did not actually implement our solution. So, this section is a summary of what we would have done if time allowed.

A. As a group we decided that we would visit two first grade classes before winter break began. Because Haleigh lives next door to a first grade teacher, she volunteered to contact two teachers. To better accommodate the teachers, Jett was assigned to find a faculty member who could accompany us to Jordan Ridge Elementary School during regular school hours.

B. On the day of the activity, we will read with each class for a half hour. Rebecca is going to being the books. Following reading time, we will give each student a piece of paper to track how much he or she read over winter break. Attached to the tracking sheet, we will include a letter to the parents explaining not only what we are doing, but also to encourage them to read with their children. Jalen is going to make and bring the tracking sheets and letters.

C. After winter break, we will again visit the classes and tally up how many minutes each class read. The winning class would get some sort of prize, and the other class would still receive a smaller prize. Haleigh and Brianna are going to bring the prizes.

Conclusion

Our group wanted to help abused animals in the world and especially in Utah. By using the Reflective-Thinking process we were able to analyze our problem, come up with criteria for our problem, think of final solutions, and lastly come up with a solution to our problem. The solution we decided on was getting individuals to adopt animals. In order to do this people needed to become more aware of abuse. We wanted to inform people about the animals that are being sheltered at the humane society. We thought that this solution would save the most animals and would be the most realistic. Getting the animals a safe home would be the most beneficial for the abused animal.

We did not end up executing our full plan. However, we did educate our class on animal abuse and on the importance of adoption. We, ourselves, also became more educated. We learned and shared about the humane society and how abused animals can be adopted there. We found many new facts about animal abuse and learned that it still occurs today, even in Utah.

Works Cited

Appendices

Appendix 1: Team ContractTask Norms:

If you miss a meeting, get the information to the group before the meeting occurs Attempt to be on time, notify if you are to be late Complete all assignments on time

Relational Norms:

Group comes first Avoid side conversations Make time to participate fully in each step

Relational Roles:

James – Participation Encourager Abbie – Empathetic Listener Lisa – Praise Giver Nicole – Tension Reliever

Task Roles:

James – Direction Giver Abbie – Starter or Energizer Lisa – Information Seeker Nicole – Gatekeeper

Studying the Problem

Characteristics: Lisa Stakeholders: Nicole History: James Policies and Politics: Abbie Resources: Lisa, Nicole, James, Abbie

Team Meeting Times:

November 6, 2014 in class November 10, 2014 in class November 12, 2014 in media Center November 14, 2014 in Media Center November 18, 2014 in class

Contact Information:

Lisa Huish (801)-913-1896 lisahuish@hotmail.com

Nicole Murri (801)-205-0108 nicolemurri18@gmail.com

Abbie Palmer (801)-661-2978 missabbie96@hotmail.com

James Richardson (801)-550-1889 jamesrichardson9000@gmail.com

Distribution of Points (10 possible)

4 points for attendance (forgiveness of 1 meeting) 3 points for completing assignments on time 2 points for assignments meeting criteria 1 point for a good attitude

Appendix 2: Solutions Analysis Chart

Solutions

Criteria Euthanize Adoption Donations Play w/them Rent-A-Puppy

Safe 0 7 9 7 7Cheap 0 5 9 2 5Realistic 0 9 0 0 5Positive 0 9 5 9 6Legal 1 9 5 5 9Total 1 39 28 23 32

Appendix 3: Statistic Charts