Interviews - Part 2

In this blog, I want to talk about my progress with my interview scheduling and how it has been going so far. Although I haven't filmed any yet, I have planned a couple and have another one that I have yet to plan.

        Before anything, I want to talk about the emails I sent to 2 companies. I know I made a blog or lightly talked about this topic in a prior posting; however, I'll do a short recap. Basically, I sent an email to 2 companies that handle dog therapy training. These companies connect to hospitals, schools, and other associations. I thought contacting the companies themselves instead of the places that use those animals would be easier. Anyway, I don't believe I mentioned it before, but one of those companies replied back to me recently. Sadly, after some back-and-forth emails, we came to the agreement that working together was not going to work out. This was only because of schedules and how our timing didn't really match with each other. Unfortunately, the other company did not email me back at all, so I decided to not rely on the possibility that they might email me back.

This whole situation got me a little worried as I only had one other idea/place that I could get an interview for that I hadn't received an answer yet: the sheriff/police office.

Sheriff's Office (My last resort):

Technically if I didn't get any interviews with them, I could've contacted another company, but who knows how long that would've taken.

Anyway, my experience with the sheriff's office has been great ever since I called them. As I mentioned in a past blog, I did call their office and got rerouted a couple of times before talking to someone appropriate. She then took some of my information down and told me to await a call, text, or email back from one of the lead officers. You knew all of that already; however, I got a response back, and I will be talking about that in the next section.

        A couple of days after the call, I received a text from a deputy from the sheriff county office I had called. She was very nice and after introducing herself she told me to call her at my convenience. A very helpful and accommodating thing was that the phone number was her personal mobile number, so I could call whenever I wanted to. I think this also helped me get more comfortable with her as I was a little bit nervous talking/texting a real police officer. A day later, I called her back and we began talking.

        Once again, I could tell that she was very nice and looking forward to working with me. At the beginning of the call, she asked me some clarifying questions to make sure she knew exactly what I wanted. Not only did she ask questions about the topic and reason for my project, but also what exactly I was looking to do with her help. After that, she asked me what kind of dog I was looking for. This question kind of stumped me because I didn't really know much. I told her a K9 dog was what I was originally looking for, and thankfully, she told me she had plenty of those at her facility. She told me that she personally worked with a therapy K9 dog and that would work perfectly with her. She also surprisingly told me that she actually comes to my school every once in a while to work with the ASD students (Autism Spectrum Disorder). I was so thrilled with the possibilities to come, and she told me that we could plan a day I would be able to go and visit her working with the dog and the students. 

        Without even asking me though, she started telling me all about the different types of dogs she had available and it shocked me. Each dog had so many different purposes and she asked me if I was looking for anything else. Shocked, I asked her if I could also interview for another breed or job with a dog so I could have more variety. Obviously, I knew that having 2 dogs from the same company or office wasn't the best, but having the accessibility she gave me, I couldn't resist.

        She suggested the bloodhound dog since she knew I was a little overwhelmed. This dog specialized in finding people. She told me that she could send me the information about the dog trainer on Monday (tomorrow), and I was so excited. Just from one phone call, I had gotten 2 different dogs that had such important distinct jobs.

        The last thing I had to do, was ask her if I could interview her before the filming of the k9 dog which I have yet to do, so tomorrow once I get the information for the bloodhound dog, I plan on asking her if I can interview her at some point in the next week.

Anyway, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed my stressful but successful (crossing my fingers) planning for my interviews.

-Dana