Join the Women's Congressional Staff Association and the Capitol Hill Community Service Association for a volunteer event with the PeopleAnimalsLove (PAL) organization. Because this is a community service event, please only register if you can attend.

Volunteers will have the opportunity to join the team at PAL for a virtual zoom event, where children will read to your pet!

Mission: PeopleAnimalsLove (PAL) uses the human-animal bond to comfort the lonely, ease the pain of the sick and enrich the world of children. PAL dogs and handlers visit 100+ Washington DC area hospitals, nursing homes, libraries, jails, schools and more. While PAL dogs are under a stay-at-home order, they’re jumping on Zoom to help kids gain skills and confidence reading aloud. During the free 30-minute sessions, children read to two different PAL dogs.

Shift Details: Volunteers and their pet (any animal that can join in on a Zoom call is allowed!) will sit in a reading session with individual children who will read a story aloud to the volunteer. The basic premise of this program is that children often feel at ease when reading aloud to animals so during these Zoom calls, the children have the chance to continue reading aloud.

The session will begin with a 30 minute training by the organization and will then proceed to a 10-15 minute session with a child. After that session, there will be a short break and then another 10-15 minute session with another child. 

Breakdown of the event:

• 6:35 pm training
• 7 pm session 1 (each handler listens to 2 kids read)
• 7:40 pm session 2 (each handler listens to 2 kids read)
• 8:20 pm done