Students and staff at Clark-Pleasant schools have a new furry friend.
Pearl, a white labradoodle, is Clark-Pleasant’s first therapy dog. She started the job this school year. She’s been on duty at different schools providing emotional support to students in different classes, from kindergarten to high school. In her first week on the job, she’s already put smiles on many faces.
“Therapy dogs are trained specifically to be aware of people’s emotions and really just be able to be calm and loved on and to be in schools to be around kids and love kids,” said Connie Poston, Clark-Pleasant’s director of behavioral health.
Pearl is the first of two therapy dogs Clark-Pleasant plans to get through its Project AWARE grant. Project AWARE is a program implemented by the Indiana Department of Education and the state’s FSSA Division of Mental Health and Addiction. Clark-Pleasant joined a cohort along with three other schools in the state to work on creating “sustainable school-based mental health systems and supports for future statewide implementation.”
With the funding from Project AWARE, Clark-Pleasant is receiving $38.39 per student, a salary for a district-wide wellness coordinator and funding for two therapy dogs through December 2026.
Therapy dogs in schools are typically used to help students to increase wellness regulation skills. The dogs can help students with social skills, prevent social isolation and also help co-regulate emotions, as well as decrease depression and anxiety, Poston said.
“If a student is escalated, needs to calm down or upset, she’s kind of intuitive to you know, register like this person’s upset, I’m going to go let them cuddle me,” Poston said.
An average week for Pearl is split between different schools in the district, serving as a calming presence for students who need her. She starts her week at Clark-Pleasant Middle School for a half day there. She then spends Monday afternoon at Whiteland Community High School’s north campus. Tuesday, she hangs out at Clark Elementary all day, then she heads to the preschool on Wednesday. She spends Thursdays at the high school. Then on Fridays, she stayed with the behavior health office for a more relaxed day, where she can be available on a request basis.
“She’s also a dog. So sometimes she just needs some chill time,” Poston said.
There are nine certified handlers for Pearl across the school district. They all had to go through a three-day training to work with her. Jeni Prenatt, assistant director of special education, is Pearl’s main handler and she lives with her.
Prenatt had to have a home visit prior to getting Pearl to make sure the environment is right for her. Prenatt is charged with a lot of maintenance of Pearl, including feeding, cleaning and brushing her regularly.
When Pearl gets home for the day, her work vest she wears at school comes off, and she knows it’s time to be a normal dog. She plays ball and does all the normal things a dog does, Prenatt said.
“She just is like our pet. And then in the mornings, we get her ready for work. As soon as she gets the vest on she knows it’s time to work,” Prenatt said.
Pearl, who turns 1 on Friday, had months of training since she was a puppy to become a therapy dog. Each day, she has to have four 15-minute training sessions with her handler, and she has to have scheduled naps.
Pearl is spending a lot of her time at the moment getting to meet students and staff at her different schools. As she walks through the school halls, everyone she walks past lights up with excitement to see her, saying “hi Pearl,” or stopping to pet her.
She’s already helped many students in the first week of school. On the first day at Break-O-Day Elementary, she helped soothe some nervous kindergartners who had never been to school before.
“There were a few that were crying, and so we had her just sit and they would pet her, and we got them throwing the ball,” Prenatt said. “Before you knew it, their tears are dried up and they were in class.”
Pearl also helped another student at Whiteland Elementary School Friday morning. The student didn’t want to get out of the car to come to school, but Pearl helped calm them down.
Students in Katie Bright’s third-grade class at Whiteland Elementary on Friday morning were elated to meet Pearl for the first time. She went around to each student for pets, cuddles and showing them different tricks. Pearl was also used in a lesson about adjectives where Bright asked students to describe different traits Pearl had, to which many said she was “calm” and “obedient.”
Therapy dogs are additionally often used to help students who struggle with reading aloud. Sometimes it can be easier to have a dog as an audience to read to, versus people, Poston said.
“When reading aloud, there’s a sense of I’m being judged, I’m being listened to, you know, somebody’s listening to me if I mess up a word,” Poston said. “… But there’s a lot of programs where the dogs can be reading buddies and a kid feels much less judged, reading to a dog.”
As the school year continues, Pearl will be there to help those students.
Clark-Pleasant officials hope to get a second therapy dog soon. They are waiting to find a dog that is the right fit, Poston said.
