Students rent pups to support rescue

The recurring UCF Rent-a-Puppy event returned to the Burnett Honors College lawn Wednesday afternoon, where students could "rent" a dog to play and walk with for 15-to-20-minute intervals.

Rent-a-Puppy is an event organized through Pet Rescue by Judy, a local no-kill animal shelter, and the Honors Educational Reach Out program at UCF. Though donations were encouraged, the event was free to all UCF students. Students only were required to sign in and provide a student ID and a phone number.

Though the first Rent-a-Puppy event of the year took place in August, HERO coordinator Rosalinda Torres said the program has been involved with Pet Rescue by Judy since early 2009.

"This mainly helps get the dogs socialized; they are rescued dogs, so they're not always acquainted with a lot of people," Torres said. "They're scared sometimes of strangers, so helping them get walked around campus and socialize with different people really helps them in their rehabilitation. But we do ask for donations to help with the program."

Pet Rescue by Judy, an animal shelter founded in 1986 by Judy Sarullo in Sanford, is a non-profit, no-kill organization for rescued dogs and cats. The main goal of the organization, Sarullo said, is to provide a home for animals that are abused, ill, injured or abandoned that would otherwise be euthanized.

"Obviously our most urgent goal is to rescue animals that are abandoned or in distress, update their vaccines and find good, new homes for them," Sarullo said on her website. "But we attempt to be more proactive than that. It is our heartfelt desire to prevent any animal from the need to be ‘rescued.'"

The Rent-a-Puppy event was first created by a former honors college AmeriCorps VISTA volunteer, Meghan Ewing Pfleiderer, in early 2009 in front of the Student Union.

Denise Crisafi, the program coordinator of research and civic engagement, explained the event's beginning.

"[Meghan] was doing a lot of work with Pet Rescue, not just organizing the program for students to volunteer here, but she was also volunteering herself," Crisafi said. "It was actually a pet rescue event, and then we just brought it here to UCF because it's such a big population of students. It started small in front of the Union, and then we decided to bring it over to Honors, and it got much bigger."

Kayla Mackey, a junior business major, has been volunteering with Pet Rescue by Judy for two years now. This commitment inspired her cornerstone project, where she and a group of students raised money for one particular dog, Queen Belle, who was found injured and in need of surgery at the animal shelter.

"It's like a win-win situation for animal lovers because we get time from an animal and that animal benefits from it more than you know," Mackey said.

The event was held from 11 a.m. until 3 p.m. Students were free to sign up for as many time slots as they liked, provided that they wait their turn.

Freshman economics major Miz Mizell was reminded of his own dog through the event.

"I miss my dog. I really miss having something fuzzy to come home to, so I'll get my doggy fix [here]," Mizell said. "It doesn't matter [which dog I got], I just wanted something fuzzy. There's so many dogs that can't be adopted; I think it's important to get that visibility out, because once you see them, you're like, ‘Oh my god, that's so cute!'"

Keena Simmons, a sophomore early childhood education major, said she attended the Rent-a-Puppy event because of the dorm ban against pets.

"[I came out] because I like dogs, and we're not allowed to have them," Simmons said. "I did this last year every month they had it. It's a great way to help the animals, and since most of us aren't allowed to have animals, it's awesome for us because we get to play for awhile."

Students interested in donating to help Queen Belle can visit Mackey's website, http://www.queenbelle.bbnow.org/index.php. Those interested in volunteering, donating, or fostering animals at Pet Rescue by Judy can visit http://www.petrescuebyjudy.com for more information.