$320 raised by 4 donors
3% complete
$10,000 Goal
Your gift of any size today creates freedom for those who experience disabilities.
Domino Service Dogs (DSD) assists people with disabilities who are training their own service dog by providing a 2-year owner-trained service dog program. We are located in Lakewood, Colorado. At DSD, we believe that training the handler is as important as training the service dog, so we have developed a program that trains both the service dog and the handler at the same time. Our program uses humane, reward-based training and teaches important dog-handling and caretaking skills.
We have been helping people to train their own service dogs as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit since 2013, and have graduated dozens of service dog teams. DSD is run BY people with disabilities FOR people with disabilities. We fill a unique niche in Colorado by providing service dog training at an affordable rate.
DSD is also an important community setting where people who are often isolated can join others with disabilities in gaining new skills and exploring the public in Denver. People with disabilities join us, and together with our dogs, we learn, try, fail, try again, and succeed. We broaden our clients’ worlds by practicing accessing the public with service dogs in training. We are so proud of our clients: they have learned and accomplished amazing feats, and they have made their lives better.
It is the mission of Domino Service Dogs to assist people with disabilities to train their own service dog, using reward-based training techniques.
The foundation for Domino Service Dogs (DSD) was laid twelve years ago when our Founder and CEO Ms. Henry's youngest daughter suffered an injury that resulted in permanent paralysis. Unwilling to sacrifice her independence, Ms. Henry's daughter insisted that she have a service dog when she was 8 years old.
Ms. Henry discovered that acquiring a service dog for a child would not be an easy task. Most well-known organizations charge substantial fees and either require children to be at least twelve years of age or suffer from a terminal diagnosis. Using her years of equine training experience, Ms. Henry set out to train her daughter's 95 pound Great Pyrenees, Badger.
It took nearly 2 years to train Badger to assist her daughter with mobility issues such as walking, getting up from the floor and pulling a manual wheelchair. Badger gave her daughter independence, self esteem and helped her forge new friendships. Ms Henry found herself immersed in the world of service dog training by addressing one person, one dog, one obstacle and one solution at a time.
After many years of providing assistance to local service dog teams, Ms Henry had people with disabilities contacting her for advice and seeking her gifted and natural ability to understand the needs of owners and their dogs. As the number of owner-trained service dog teams receiving her assistance rapidly grew from 1 to 7, Ms. Henry decided to form an organization that would empower people, four paws at a time. DSD has provided support to more than 30 owner-trained service dog teams to date.
Organization name
Domino Service Dogs
other names
DSD
2013
Tax id (EIN)
46-3426784
Category
Human Services
Organization Size
Medium Organization
Address
6505 W. Alameda Unit 101Mailing
PO Box 140245Jefferson County, CO, US