I used to volunteer at our humane society a year ago, but had to stop because of moving to college. I didn't have the time and a way to get there. I was a dog walker there. Even though that sounds easy, it requires a long class as well as earning three stickers on your badge which are awarded by the "veteran walkers". You have to learn how to take the dogs in and out of the place correctly, understand the walk board and what dogs can be walked by everyone, which ones are staff only, and the ones that are veteran and staff dogs. You also have to understand how to get one dog out of a cage that has two in it, as well as understand how to use the ez-walk harness.
Veteran walkers had I believe, 3 months of walking experience, and had to take a dog signal behavior class. Dogs that were veteran and staff only were the dogs with aggressiveness issues mainly, though some did have other issues.
I did take the dog signal behavior class, and was up for my veteran badge, but wasn't able to get it because of school and other such obligations. I still get weekly emails from them though, which got annoying after a while because I'm not able to volunteer anymore.
I loved volunteering there. It always made the dogs so happy to be taken out on a walk. And I loved when people would come in and ask about them, and I was able to give them some advice, because I knew they might just take one home. We did get puppies once, and we have to lock those cages because people stole puppies in the past. They were gone in about a week or so, tiny little things all yapping in one cage together. We had a large number of pit bulls once, which isn't uncommon. And at one point, we had so few dogs that each dog could have two cages. The single large cages, built for just one dog, have little gates between them if we want to open the cage so the dog has more room. We had so few dogs that month that we were able to do so, which was great. Until people started opening one door to take the dog out, and then opening the other door to put it back in but forgot to close the first door. We had dogs running everywhere.
I loved the names we got too. A few Loki's, a Thor, and Odin..No Frigga though. I would have had the whole family, but we never got a Frigga.
I'd love to do it again, but I have no transportation to get there, so even if I had the time next year, I wouldn't have a way to get there.