Samuel Kim

There are many active clubs on the CHS campus, from Asian-Student Union, to Interact, to ArtStart. Starting one’s own club takes a lot of persistent effort and hard work, and not everyone has the time to do that. But some people not only put in the time and effort, they go above and beyond; they make sure their club represents something they stand for, as is the case of sophomore David Xue.
Xue is the club president of the Comfort Creature Club, previously known as the Pet Welfare Club last year. Back then, the club was focused on volunteering at the local Priceless Pets Animal Shelter in Claremont, where they would help care for the animals. This included walking the dogs, cleaning cats’ litter boxes, changing bedding, and simply interacting with the animals to keep them happy and entertained. However, the shelter is currently undergoing repairs for a broken AC, which means it is unavailable for volunteering as of now. Additionally, Xue wanted to expand the variety of CHS clubs, as many already volunteer at different places and he wanted something unique. That’s when the idea struck him at the beginning of the year: why not offer animal therapy to CHS?
“I was feeling kinda stressed, and what helped me was going to my friend’s house and just playing with their cat and with their dog,” Xue said. “And I was thinking—hey, we could kinda solve two problems with one program.”
He wanted to be able to help students destress from their school or personal life, while also putting more attention on shelter pets. It would be a win for both sides, students could enjoy the company of animals, and the animals could be exposed to potential adopters. With this idea in mind, Xue set out to create a plan.
As CHS has many policies regarding pets on campus, Xue needed to choose a location close enough to students that they could easily reach it if needed, yet off its immediate premises. The place that met all these criteria was the YAC, or Youth Activity Center located in Joāt Park. If possible, he eventually wanted to get pet therapy onto campus during lunch. Xue reached out to Brandon Brown and Skylar Segura, two of the coordinators of the YAC, by email to introduce the idea and ask if they were interested in offering animal therapy. They showed intrigue in the idea and told him to attend their next staff meeting, on September 18th. A powerpoint was created covering the mission of the club and what it stands for.
“I kinda want to show them that, hey, we’re not just a bunch of sophomores that don’t know what we’re doing,” Xue said. “We have a plan, we’ve done the work, and we can be professional when we need it.”
His current outline was for the therapy to happen once a month at the YAC after school. Students would book slots of times, which could differ depending on the animals that are available, the number of students, and hours the shelters can operate. As far as animals, the club would be offering cats from both the Priceless Pets and Cats and Comics shelters. Xue is working on getting other animals like dogs, chinchillas, and bunnies as well, depending on the outcome of the first sessions. In order to participate, waivers regarding safety for both the students and the animal will be signed prior to a session; as any animal has the potential to be unpredictable. Staff and volunteers would be present the entire time, and were an animal to exhibit annoyed or aggressive behavior, it would be removed from the room to calm down.
And Xue does not want to stop there either. After he received approval from the YAC’s staff for therapy every month, he is looking to increase the number of times therapy is offered, hopefully to every week. He is also looking to expand the club to other schools and is already in contact with interested students outside of CHS.
A pilot program is planned to run before actual students interact with the animals, as well as the shelter pets to be screened to determine which ones can handle interaction, and which ones cannot.
Other officers, including Joshua Ong, are on board with this idea.
“There wasn’t really anything wrong with just volunteering at animal shelters,” said Ong. “Though I feel like a lot of people weren’t really involved, they just came to the club to hang out. I think now that we’re starting to implement animal therapy into our school, a lot more people can be involved—not only just in our club, but people from outside our club.”
Xue’s next step after approval is to reach out to the shelters he’s working with. This is to not only implement safety requirements, but to gather supplies, and learn what volunteers would need to know before helping with the program. The volunteers would then be trained prior to the start of the pilot program, which is yet to be determined.
If everything goes smoothly, students will be able to head to the YAC after school, de-stress, and relax with the shelter animals through the work of Xue and the Comfort Creature Club in the next few months.