1. What is the purpose and goal of the establishment of your guide dog school?
We were established in 1991. The purpose of our establishment is to train, guide dogs and provide them to visually impaired friends for free. In the past few years, in addition to training guide dogs, we also have professionals who are training guide dogs, such as guide dog trainers and instructors, as well as educating the public on guide dogs and promoting guide dogs. Services related to dog welfare, etc.
2. In our survey, there are about 60,000 visually impaired people in Taiwan, but very few guide dogs. In response to this data, does your school have any policies or goals for the future to change this issue?
3. Does your school have enough guide dogs for every visually impaired person?
According to estimates from the International Guide Dog Federation, one out of every 100 visually impaired friends has the need to use a guide dog. If there are 60,000 visually impaired friends in Taiwan like you found, then, there should be 600 working guide dogs, but now there are only about 40 guide dogs serving visually impaired friends on the road. There are several main reasons why there is such a huge gap. The first is that the gold fee is insufficient. If the gold fee is used, we need more gold fees to train more guide dogs, because visually impaired friends apply for guide dogs for free. We train these guide dogs at an early stage. The fee for blind dogs will not be charged to visually impaired friends, so there will be a huge and stable financial fee to support our development. The second missing thing is the foster family of the guide dog. The foster family is the most important link in the life of the guide dog. They mainly help these dogs and take care of them to develop good home living habits when they are young. Practice these socialized training such as taking the bus/MRT outside. In fact, if foster families are not enough, even if we have a lot of male and female dogs, we can’t cultivate many puppies to improve our guide to the blind. dog speed. The last question is the friendliness of the public, because, in fact, the development of guide dogs to the present, Article 60 of the Law on the Protection of the Rights and Interests of Persons with Disabilities has passed the guarantee of the right of guide dogs and guide dogs to freely enter and exit public places, but In fact, our dogs are still very often rejected in restaurants/business premises, which will reduce the willingness of visually impaired friends to apply for guide dogs, so the third important thing that needs everyone's help is to improve our friendliness to guide dogs.
4. Is there any other company subsidizing your school or does the government subsidize yourGuide dog school? Where will most of the donations go?
In terms of enterprises, there are no companies or government help. In addition, 90% of our funding sources depend on the love of the public, and the remaining 10% are government subsidies. So in fact, the main source of funding is really Thank you Taiwanese society for your support. Our most stable source of income is each person's regular fixed donation. The so-called regular fixed amount may be a regular monthly deduction from his credit card, whichmay be 300 or 500 dollars per month. The first one will not cause a burden on the economy. But if a lot of this kind of power is to help us, the most stable source of income. Like last year during level 3 alert, for a long time During the period, we did not have any external fundraising activities. In fact, we rely on these regular and fixed donors to support our operations.
5. Because of the epidemic, does this institution have any problems due to the epidemic? (For example, the trouble caused)
6. How do you find suitable puppies to be trained as guide dogs?
In fact, the covid-19 disease had a great impact. The first is that in the process of training guide dogs, a very important thing is that they need socialized training. But in the epidemic, dogs can’t go out. We should not go out unless it’s necessary. We need to reduce the number of times that we practice taking the bus or public transportation system, and the frequency of our trainers training outside with guide dogs is also reduced. Extend the time we spend training dogs, and the most important thing is the source of gold fees because if there is an epidemic at the beginning, we cannot do semi-foreign activities. In this case, our source of gold fees will be greatly reduced in an instant. For guide dogs for the blind, guide dogs have been seriously affected by the epidemic in the whole world, and our epidemic situation in Taiwan is actually about a year later than in other countries, so in fact, we often have some dogs. For example, guide dog schools in other countries have sent dogs to us, but in recent years, there will be less, because everyone may have reduced the number of guide dogs bred due to the impact of the epidemic. The epidemic can end as soon as possible, and then return to normal life.
7. What breeds of guide dogs are available in your school and the reasons for choosing them?
In the case of guide dogs, they all bred the next generation in the blood of guide dogs, so infact, they can be guide dogs only if their ancestors have not attacked people for eightgenerations, so if you see guide dogs on the road You don’t need to worry about these dogsbeing absolutely non-aggressive to humans, so our dogs were first introduced to Taiwan fromforeign guide dog agencies, and then bred in Taiwan. We are now For example, our puppiesborn last year sent three to a guide dog organization in Hong Kong and then three to a guidedog organization in South Korea. There will be frequent exchanges between these guide dogschools internationally. To ensure that dogs are not inbred to cause genetic diseases, all guideDogs are bred in the blood of guide dogs and then trained as guide dogs. There is no way forordinary pet dogs because most of the reasons why guide dogs are eliminated in training aredue to personality factors, so we have cultivated guide dogs based on the personality of the breeding dogs. I have also made a selection. Even though most of our guide dogs are LabradorRetrievers, many drug detection dogs use Labrador Retrievers, but our guide dogs and narcotics dogs have very different personalities. In terms of breeding, it will also improve the success rate of guide dog training. If you use dogs that are not in the blood of guide dogs for training, it may be difficult for one hundred to become a guide dog.
8. Will the guide dog communicate with the visually impaired? If so, how do they communicate?
The communication between a visually impaired and a guide dog is very much like a family. Dogs can’t speak and the visually impaireds can’t see either. They may find problems by the dog's responses when they touch them, such as when they touch them. The condition of the dog, and the fact that when a visually impaired came to apply for a guide dog with us. The trained guide dogs do not serve the visually impaired right away, the person should learn how to take care of the dog first. Visually impaired people come to learn how to take care of this dog, so visually impaired friends can feed him food/take him to the toilet/brush his teeth/comb/clean his ears/ even give him a bath every day from the most basic things done independently. In fact, there is no need to worry about whether visually impaired friends can take good care of these dogs. In fact, dogs will also develop tacit understanding in the process of living with visually impaired friends. In many cases, after they have completed training together for a year or two, The tacit understanding between this dog and its owner is actually very good.
9. What method does your school use to train guide dogs?
In fact, there are many ways of training. Their ultimate purpose is to teach guide dogs to helpvisually impaired friends quickly and safely avoid obstacles. This obstacle might be what we often see on the roadside. Such as motorcycles parking on the side of obstacles that are high. For example, when we are walking on the road, there may be low-hanging branches next to them. These are obstacles that guide dogs can help visually impaired friends avoid. There have been many new changes in the way of training. For example, in the earliest period, when the development of guide dogs started in Germany, it was developed during the First World War. We happened to develop guide dogs a few years ago. On the 100th anniversary, at that time, there were some in Europe that started the process of guide dog training. They held the guide dog in one hand and the cane in the other hand, and then beat the dog. So in fact, the way of training in the past few years, there are always changes in the hope that a better way is to take care of the well-being of these dogs and at the same time allow them to be happy with theirtraining.
10 Why do some blind people choose to use guide dogs instead of guide sticks? Are there any advantages and advantages of a guide dog over a guide stick?
The biggest difference between a guide dog and a white cane is that this dog is alive. The first thing a guide dog can do for a visually impaired friend is to quickly and safely avoid obstacles. When a visually impaired friend and the guide dog are walking on the road, the dog can quickly help him determine the path that he can walk. If he is using a cane today, it may have to hit the ground left and right, and he will be able to find him after a long time. The route that can be passed, and the second one is that a guide dog can help visually impaired friends to find the target they want, so many people may feel blind. The target will be something like McDonald's, but in fact the target is meaningless. The target is like the ticket gate of the MRT /empty seat/escalator seat/elevator button or even the seat of the door handle. These are things that guide dogs that can be found for visually impaired friends. The last and most important thing is that this guide dog can often be a good companion for visually impaired friends, because in fact, many of our visually impaired friends use guide dogs. They work alone in Taipei and then live by themselves. They just feel that this dog is his family. After he goes home, the dog will accompany him like his younger siblings/his children. In fact, in addition to walking support, psychological support is also very important. of.
13. May I ask what kind of training guide dogs should be trained to be able to formally work and help the visually impaired?
Guide dogs have started to do very simple training since they were born. When they were young, it was basic training, such as socialization training, learning to take the bus/MRT/going in and out of different public places, at home If you do, you will learn some basic commands such as sit/wait and so on. After you are one year old, you will return to our guide dog school, and a trainer will lead them to start walking training for visually impaired friends. In the beginning, for example, practice walking in a straight line, and if there is an obstacle in front of you, how to dodge the obstacle. In the beginning, the trainer will teach these dogs that this is the entrance and you have to stop / this is an obstacle and you have to avoid it. But in fact, the responsibility of this judgment will gradually shift to the dog after training. It becomes that the dog is going to judge that there is a way to go here, and how can I find a way to go if I can't go this way. A very special feature of guide dogs is that many people think that they will bring their visually impaired friends to cross the road, but in fact, they are not. They will bring their visually impaired friends to find the horse intersection and then they will stop at the intersection, and then they will be visually impaired. If a visually impaired friend judges that the direction of traffic is the direction he wants to walk, he will give instructions to the dog, and the dog will continue to take him forward, so it is not Said that the guide dog directly took a visually impaired friend across the road when it reached the intersection. What's more special is that the biggest difference between guide dogs and all working dogs is that they will have smart resistance, because when they lead a visually impaired friend, the visually impaired friend may judge wrongly, and he may think that he can now. Crossing the road, but it doesn't work, then, the dog will resist the owner's wrong instructions for him. We all teach a visually impaired friend to walk on the road. If you give the dog an order to go forward but he doesn't go, what is the reason? We may have to list some reasons, and then give him the order. In the training process, the most difficult thing is that the dog needs to judge by itself. Our trainer will wear an eye patch in the middle and back of the training, simulating the situation that the visually impaired friend is completely blind and let the dog take him with him. If this dog can successfully complete this task, then he can be ready to serve his visually impaired friends.
15. How can the visually impaired help the dog to bathe or feed the guide dog?
This is what we will teach them to do when they are paired at the beginning. In fact, it is not as difficult as everyone thinks, because visually impaired friends also bathe and wash their hair, so they are sometimes better than us when they come to bathe the dog because they wash them by carefully touching them. We had a visually impaired friend who was very afraid of dogs. The most difficult part of teaching him was to brush the dog's teeth every day. We have a finger-tipped toothbrush, and your hand needs to get into the dog's mouth. He was very terrified by the guide dog’s mouth. After he learned it and found that our dogs would never be aggressive to people. Dogs also like to brush their teeth, because the toothbrush has some beef flavor, so they like it very much. So, it will think it is good to do this thing, so this is when the visually impaired friend was brushing the dog's teeth once. He felt that when he brushed the toothbrush to a certain point in the last few times, then the dog's feet would move. He felt very strange and took the dog to the doctor. It turned out that his tooth was slightly chipped. So, in fact, when visually impaired friends take care of dogs, they may know more about their own points than ours. Many people think it's amazing how they help dogs pick up poop. Because dogs poop. Because guide dogs are trained to listen to instructions to go to the toilet, when they are trained, they do not defecate anywhere. Instead, visually impaired friends take them to a designated spot, where the dog will go to the toilet after giving an order there. When the dog starts to go to the toilet, the visually impaired friend will touch the dog's back to determine whether the dog is peeing or pooping. If the dog is pooping today, he will touch the position of the dog's buttocks and remember where it is. Then, after the dog left the toilet, the visually impaired friend would put the plastic tape on his hand, and then pick up all the poop. Picked up cleaner than many discerning owners. Yes, so these are all things that visually impaired friends can do by themselves.
17. If the owner falls or is injured and cannot move, how should the guide dog help him to be eligible?
In fact, at this time, it was not the guide dog who helped him, but the general public to assist the visually impaired person. Then we have a very important principle of four different questions in the training process of blind dogs. The fourth is not to touch, not to feed, not to call, and not to refuse guide dogs. The first three are not just to not disturb their work. And the fourth is not to deny them access to public places. The last and most important thing is to take the initiative to ask. This is where all people with sight can help visually impaired friends, not only visually impaired people with guide dogs, but all visually impaired friends need everyone. When you need help, you can take the initiative to ask him if you need help. Once before, when our guide dog user and his dog were guiding him to take a ride at the MRT station near him, he heard the sound of the white cane hitting the ground in the corner of the wall. Then he wanted to go directly to work, and then he felt that it was impossible. He kept hearing that voice over there and he wanted to help the visually impaired people. He told his dog to go in that direction. Then he walked over there and it turned out that another visually impaired person was really lost. He tried to find the service desk but couldn't find it and went to the corner in the other direction. Then our guide dog asked another lost, visually impaired friend to put his shoulders on his shoulders, and then let the dog lead them to the service desk. He then handed the lost visually impaired person to the person at the help desk, and the dog took him to the company by MRT. Yes, so many times, if a visually impaired friend is really injured today, of course, our guide dogs cannot carry the visually impaired friend on his shoulders and take him to the rescue. This is when you really need your help.
20. How do you help visually impaired people choose guide dogs? Are there any restrictions or methods?
In fact, there are several basic conditions for the visually impaired to apply for a guide dog. For example, he must be over eighteen and under sixty-five, and that's a person of sound mind and body because we don't want him to abuse a dog either. Then he must have the ability to walk independently, but also the ability to be oriented. The so-called orientation ability is that although he can't see, the visually impaired friend can judge his position by many different methods, such as wind direction, smell, number of steps, etc. Therefore, if these visually impaired friends come to apply for guide dogs, we will first conduct a review process to assess whether they have actual needs for guide dogs. Because the route that the guide dog can walk is actually trained, it is not that the dog will walk with a visually impaired friend when he goes to an unfamiliar environment. You can imagine this dog as a living car. The same is true when driving. For example, the person driving the car turns the steering wheel, moves forward, and backs up. These are all done by the person driving. So in fact, when the guide dog guides the visually impaired friend to walk, the visually impaired friend gives instructions to let the dog lead him forward. Therefore, this visually impaired friend needs to have the ability to orient himself to judge and say, "I am now at the place to turn, so I will tell the dog to turn left, and then the dog will take him to turn left. Then, once the pairing is successful, the visually impaired friend must pay for the living expenses of the dog. The cost of living is about 3,000 dollars a month, including food such as dog food, and the money they need to see a doctor. When doing this matching, in fact, when a visually impaired friend applies for a blind dog, it does not mean that the first dog who has been trained will give the first visually impaired friend who applies for some personality matching. As a simple example, some people walk fast and some people walk slowly. So today if a dog who walks fast is matched with a visually impaired person who walks slowly, then they are not a good match. Dogs can actually sense human emotions very easily. Therefore, some dogs are more prone to nervousness and lack self-confidence. Many visually impaired friends may also be easily nervous and lack self-confidence. Well, if today is a nervous visually impaired friend with a nervous dog. Then the two of them may be confused about what we should do now when they reach the intersection. That's not a good combination. In this pairing process, our guide dog’s instructors will make a suitable pairing according to their living environment, psychological state, needs, etc. Then, the instructors will give this dog to a visually impaired person who is suitable for it.
21. Will someone check the dog's health or service status regularly after graduation?
Yes, they must have regular health checks every year. Before the age of seven, it was done once a year, and after the age of seven, they had to do it once every six months. If the vet discovers that it has some health problems, it needs to be tracked every two or three months. For example, some dogs may have had blood tests before. Indexes can be tracked as needed, and the visually impaired should follow the veterinarian's instructions to take care of the dog. Then we will have at least two or three follow-up coaching a year after the pairing is successful. To do this, our instructor will hide in a long distance to see how the dog is working with this person, to make sure that the visually impaired friend takes care of the dog kindly and that the dog has the correct guidance and vision.
22. How will guide dogs be disposed of after retirement and what is their life after retirement?
After retirement, it's a good life. In fact, according to their words, the working age of guide dogs is about the age when dogs are ready to retire when they are about 8 to 10 years old. Then, after the age of 8, our instructor will start to closely track the dog's relationship with its visually impaired friends to ensure that this dog can still handle the workload of the guide dog. Well, a dog who is in good health will retire before the age of ten at the latest. After retirement, we will also help him find an adoptive family, and then they will live the life of a pet in the adoptive family until they pass away. In fact, even if these dogs are adopted, they will be tracked at least once a year, and then ensure that these adopted dogs are well cared for by the adoptive family.
23. If the guide dog makes a mistake at work, what should we do as passers-by so as not to frighten the guide dog?
In fact, our dogs are very kind to people. If someone approaches them, they are not frightened by it. So the last question in the four different questions just now is to ask visually impaired friends if they need help. Because many people really love dogs, remember to ask the visually impaired friend if there is anything he can help, instead of directly holding the dog and saying Is the dog alright or something. So the most important thing is that when some people may want to help, they want to pull the dog at the first moment. but in fact, the first moment is actually to ask the visually impaired friend if there is anything I can help. The visually impaired friend will tell you what kind of assistance it needs from you.