Taking The Lead Podcast_Remote_Monica_031726
Christina: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Taking the Lead podcast where we empower people to be unstoppable. I'm Christina Haner with my co-host Alyssa Otis and Timothy Kyo. So we're finally getting into spring. It feels like winter went on forever for. Ever. And Timothy's not allowed to talk 'cause he lives in Georgia. Yeah,
Alyssa: we
Christina: don't wanna
Alyssa: hear Timothy.
Timothy: It's been spring for a couple months already, so
Christina: Ugh. We get a 50
Alyssa: degree day here and I'm walking around the block taking my dog out. Just odd sunbathing if I could.
Christina: Well, and we didn't have the sun up here for the longest time.
Alyssa: Welcome to Michigan.
Christina: I know,
Timothy: yeah. When I was up there early this year, I don't remember seeing the sun there.
So
Alyssa: it was, it
Timothy: was pretty bad. Yeah.
Alyssa: Yeah, I know. My son now says the sky is blue and a little gray.
Christina: That is so cute. I
Alyssa: say that's Well, that's where we live, buddy. Sorry.
Christina: Yeah. Well. And I know we all start to travel in the spring. Yeah. You've exciting plans. I know. I'm finally gonna go on my honeymoon.
Alyssa: Yay.
Christina: We're going to the [00:01:00] Maldives, so that will be a very nice trip. A very long flight. But you know what, this is probably the only time that we'll ever do this, so yeah, we were like, let's go big.
Alyssa: Go big. Turn your phones off, turn 'em on airplanes. So nobody bothers you. Yeah,
Christina: I will not be looking at my phone. I was say like our, we're like, this is the one trip that, and I did this for when we went up north too, but like, I'm just, I don't wanna be on my phone.
I'll take pictures and stuff. Stuff that's but like. There's no, what's the point? Yeah. I'm in a whole other country. You can't get ahold of me. That's
Alyssa: it. Be in the moment.
Christina: Yeah.
Alyssa: Yeah. I know. We're, well, I'm not going to the Maldives, uh, but we're going camping. I don't know. Not nearly as exciting. Definitely in the, in the state even.
I don't think we're, we're leaving Michigan, but we are going up to, uh, Mackinac Island.
Christina: Ooh, that will be nice.
Alyssa: Very. Are you
Christina: taking Remy?
Alyssa: We are taking, yeah, we're taking our son. Yeah, we're leaving the dog, but we'll take the baby.
Christina: Yeah,
Alyssa: it'll be good. We just, I hope he's not too afraid of all the horses on the island.
Christina: Oh, that will be a fun first memory
Alyssa: for him. Yeah. Any big plans [00:02:00] Timothy, or just enjoying the warmth down there?
Timothy: Enjoying the well more, I think in May later on I've gotta go to, uh, Minnesota for a leader, dog for a convention, so I'm looking forward to that.
Alyssa: Oh, traveling for
us.
Timothy: Not much.
Alyssa: I was gonna say it wouldn't be a, a month of the year without Timothy traveling for us.
Yeah.
Christina: Thank you Timothy. We appreciate all that you do.
Timothy: I enjoy doing it.
Alyssa: So today's guest has been involved with Leader Dog since 2019 and is currently working on the implementation of the Behavior Checklist, a system designed to track and support our dog's behavior across their entire lifecycle. From early development and puppy raising to on-campus training and breeding stock.
Christina: Monica started at Leader Dog in 2019, is an apprentice guide dog mobility instructor where she worked with training dogs, matching dogs with clients. Instructing the client dog team on how to work successfully. In 2024, Monica transitioned to a role of data coordinator for the breeding department where she's working on implementing new strategies for collecting data on our dogs.
Timothy: Monica, welcome to the podcast. [00:03:00] When I saw the outline for this, I thought mean this is gonna be an interesting podcast. So welcome to the podcast. Can you tell us what brought you to Leader Dog?
Monica: Thank you so much for having me. I would say that my path to Leader Dogs was not a direct like point A to point B line.
Um, I'm actually from the suburbs of Toronto, Ontario, so shout out to any Canadians who are currently listening. Um, and my background was in applied behavior analysis and I specialized in autism and behavioral services. So I spent about eight years as a therapist working in autism, uh, services. And it give me.
I gotta repeat myself. 3, 2, 1. And it gave me, um, a lot of background in teaching and generalizing skills. Um, I focused mostly on school readiness, emotional self-regulation, building independence, and some social skills. Um, and I got to have a lot of experience with parent coaching, sibling coaching, and [00:04:00] also being a consultant for other healthcare professionals and, uh, school teachers.
So it was kind of a. Lot of experience with teaching. Um, but in 2018 I actually immigrated to Michigan, and as you can imagine, that is a very slow process. Um, sometimes you're waiting six months for the next step. Other times you're waiting 12 months. So it gave me a lot of time to reflect. So by the time I got my green card, I was open to seeing if I could.
Serve people in other ways. And, um, I do actually have a grandmother, so shout to my grandma who might be listening right now. Um, she's 92 years old and still living independently in Toronto, this huge metropolitan city. I. So I was always interested in the types of services that she received in Canada. So when I saw the job posting for the Apprentice GDMI posting, I, you know, I read it and I was like, I think my skills are transferable.
I came to Leader Dogs and [00:05:00] somebody here thought my skills were transferable, thank goodness. And uh, yeah, I just kind of pivoted completely from. The kind of autism services career path I was on and dived headfirst into the guide dog services industry. And I have no regrets because there was just something about leader dogs where I knew I was gonna make a bigger impact and I was supposed to be here.
Alyssa: I love that. I have no regrets that you started here either Monica and I are, uh, we were on the same team training team for quite a while as G dm. I, so, but so you did the GDMI thing, which I know you enjoyed. I again, got to work with you, which was great. Now you've moved kind of into our, our breeding department, and you're working on a behavior checklist.
So for listeners who are new to this, what is the behavior checklist? Why is it important for guide dog training in general?
Monica: Yeah, so good question. Um, the behavior checklist, or I'm gonna use the acronym BCL, um, it is a standardized scoring system, uh, to record observable behaviors of dogs. Um, there [00:06:00] is 52 items that you can potentially score for whenever you are out with a dog, observing them or evaluating them, and they kind of cover the areas of the dog's confidence.
Their environmental sensitivity, um, how they interact with other dogs and people, um, as well as some of the more guide dog specific traits that we're looking for. So problem solving, um, their focus and being able to recover from those dreaded, dreaded distractions that happen out there.
Christina: Yeah. Okay. I have to ask because you guys use so many different things to te us their behavior, and you recently sent an email out about missing one of those things.
Can you talk about the different tools you guys use to test with the dogs? Because it was a really funny email about a child mannequin. Yeah. Only at leader. Yeah,
Monica: only it later. Yeah, so the test, um, there is a specific type of indoor test, uh, called a GD BART that we run. And it does use very specific stimuli 'cause it's a set protocol and one of them [00:07:00] happened to be a child size mannequin.
Um, and that's just to see again, will the dog respond to that kind of stimuli in a positive or negative way. Um, but yeah, there are a lot of. Pieces to that, and when one goes missing, I had to send out an email to say, Hey, the mannequin wandered off.
Alyssa: Yeah, it showed back up wearing a sun hat and a little floral Hawaiian shirt.
Yeah, so it must have had a good vacation.
Monica: Definitely, I think it's enjoying all this, uh, warmer weather that we're starting to get. Um, but I will say that the, oh, go Timothy.
Timothy: I was gonna tell you how important the, the BCL is for these guide dogs when they're from the point that they're born and it goes on to their, their, their, uh, the, uh, when they're being trained.
Is that when you measure between those times or does it go beyond that?
Monica: Yeah, so the scoring system can be used at any point throughout the life cycle of a leader dog. So you can start it as early as an eight week old puppy. Um, and you can continue all the way into, even when it is a guide dog out with a client.
[00:08:00] Um, so it's really nice to kind of be using the same, um, evaluation and scoring across, um, that dog's lifecycle. 'cause you can really kind of track their development behaviorally over time.
Alyssa: So. What other things are you kind of looking at when you are doing these bcls? Like what are some of the behaviors that it measures?
What kind of information are you taking in? Does it depend on the dog or is it kind of standardized?
Monica: Um, well, there's 52 things we can score for. Oh,
Alyssa: wow.
Monica: But, um, and that kind of depends on where that dog is in their life cycle. So say they're currently with, uh, a razor out in the environment and we want to look at their four month, uh, benchmark.
Um, so we can take our little checklist of 52 items and we can go on what we call a walk and talk where you're just out with the razor and you're walking on a route that's familiar to them. And you're talking about how the puppy is, um. Behaving with certain things or responding to certain things. Um, and you can really check like what is their response to traffic?[00:09:00]
Um, what is their response to another dog? What is their response to, you know? And there's just 52 items that you can kind of pick from. And it's a lot, lot of, yes. Yeah.
Christina: 52 things that it measures. That is a lot. So how do you decide what you're measuring with like each dog?
Monica: Um, it's pretty much you try to capture as much as you can when you can.
Um, it kind of depends on. Where you're currently observing the dog, are you doing an indoor test where it's a lot more structured and you kind of know, okay, for sure we're gonna be able to hit these 13 or 14 items versus out in the real world where you never know what's gonna come across and then you'd be like, Ooh, I can score for that 'cause it just happened.
Um, so it's kind of, it depends more on where you are observing the dog versus, you know, you don't really have a plan, you just kind of go with what's there.
Christina: Yeah. And how did you. Learn about a dog's behavior. That is such an interesting thing.
Monica: I guess dog behavior is pretty, there's a lot of science behind it.
There's a lot of research that goes into it. [00:10:00] Um, there's a lot of courses that you can take on dog behavior. There's even, you know, people who become doctorates in the field of animal behavior. Um, so it's just kind of, you know. That's why I really like using this system 'cause it was created by Dr. James Chappelle at the University of Pennsylvania, um, in partnership with other guide dog organizations.
So over time it's become this kind of internationally recognized tool that you can use to evaluate dog behavior.
Alyssa: Yeah, and I know Monica's always been an evidence-based training individual. She's always counted her clicks and she's, she's counted how many times the dog did this or did that when she was A-G-D-M-I.
And so it's gotta be nice to have this kind of standardized amongst anybody I asked doing this, uh, BCL evaluation. It's pretty standard.
Monica: Yeah, it is kind of this, again, kind of an internationally recognized tool. Um, even, uh, the International Working Dog Registry, or IWDR has incorporated this tool, um, where Leader Dogs is currently one of a thousand [00:11:00] users in this database, and they have over 100.
Thousand dogs in this database.
Christina: Wow.
Monica: And that is kind of capturing medical diagnoses that dogs have received, as well as these behavior checklist scores. So you're kind of getting the medical and behavioral on those many dogs, and it's really good for the guide dog industry or the service dog industry in general because it's been translated into nine different languages.
So it really is global. Wow. And it really does help with cooperatives, right? So if a school wants to work with, like, if we wanna work with a school in Japan, when we're talking about behavior, we both understand what that means. 'cause we're using the same scoring system. Mm-hmm. So we're talking apples to apples.
Um, as well as there's a lot of research that's being done by using the IWDR database. So there's. Universities and other organizations that wanna do research on the golden retriever breed and how can we breed healthier, um, more work oriented dogs.
Christina: That is so interesting. When I [00:12:00] first joined Leader Dog, now it's been almost.
What, four and a half, almost five years. I did not know how much science was like behind everything in our canine center. So being a part of this and working in that data, what, is there anything that's been interesting to you that you found out about dogs or the behavior and this whole BCL checklist?
Monica: Um, I think one of the coolest things that I've discovered is that we can use this, especially the IWDR database, um, we can use their medical and behavioral scores to create estimated breeding values or EBVs.
And if you're about to ask, what's an eeb, Monica,
Alyssa: I was gonna say, we dunno.
Monica: Um, so an EBV, uh, pretty much predicts what trait a dog is likely to pass on to its puppies. Um, and so again, you're taking into consideration the individual medical and behavioral information on that dog, but you're also looking at all of its parents and [00:13:00] siblings going back five generations or more.
Uh, we call that pedigrees. Um, and then you're also looking at. If this dog has already produced puppies for us, what were the end results of those puppies when it comes to their health and behavior? So all of that information creates an estimated breeding value.
Christina: That would make my head spin. Sounds like a lot of spreadsheets to me.
I don't know.
Monica: Luckily the IWR makes it really user friendly. Yeah. Um, 'cause you could imagine how many hours it would take to try to calculate that manually. So it's really nice to be kind of tapping into the IWR where they, they kind of do it for us, which is, is lovely.
Timothy: How far out if the dog becomes a career dog do you track, would track that dog if they went home with a client?
Christina: I think Timothy's asking like a dog goes home with a client, how far out would you measure? Are you tracking anything? Are you track the dog, you know, when it's home with the client?
Monica: Oh, okay. So yes. Um, well there is an annual survey that, um, I don't think the [00:14:00] IWDR has it, but there's a third company that does, and I.
Dr. McCray, our lovely theologist has actually worked to get some funding so that we can incorporate that at Leader Dogs as well. So it's an annual survey that gets sent out to any client that has a working dog. Yeah. As well as any adopter that has. Ended up with a career change because we need that medical and behavioral information coming back to us.
'cause that tells us what the EBDs of our current dogs are based off of the history of our previous dogs. So shout out to all my clients right now when I tell you to give your medical records to our veterinarians. Please do. We need that medical information for longitudinal things because we do know there are some behavioral issues or medical issues that show up later in a dog's life, like at six.
Yeah, that dog is still young, but there is some stuff that's coming up and it'd be nice to know that now so we can make better decisions for the future.
Alyssa: For sure. The more information that we have on the dogs throughout their [00:15:00] entire life, the better. Better we can do. With that info, but that, I mean, again, yes, the clients have to, to tell us their, their vet records.
Tell us how your dogs are doing. Always. We are always gonna advocate for keeping us in the loop of what you guys have going on. Uh, but sounds like, I mean, there's a lot of moving parts to this BCL. So you, do you have a team? Do you use, who does these. It can't just be you. I know we have too many dogs today.
Monica: Yeah. So yeah, there is a a lot that we need to track, especially if you're looking at the dog across its development and across its life cycle. So there's a lot of departments involved here at Leader Dog. So obviously the department I'm currently in, the breeding team is involved. Um, and then it kind of.
Passes on to puppy care while the puppies are here on campus and before they go out to their volunteers. And then once they go out to their volunteer raises, then puppy development is getting involved and then they come back onto campus. So then our dog care is getting involved and then they get assigned to a trainer and then the guide dog services team is getting involved.
Um, and then [00:16:00] eventually they go out to a client or to an adopter. Um. Or an alternative career. And then we need that annual survey to kind of get involved. So there is a lot. So collecting this data takes a lot of resources. Um, and luckily we do have happy, supportive team members that are trying to do their best with the resources they got.
And we also have a lot of volunteers as well.
Alyssa: I feel like it wouldn't be a podcast if we didn't talk about how great our volunteers are here. Yeah. So just another way that volunteers maybe weren't being, uh, you know, used here at Leader Dog four years ago, that now they've got this really unique opportunity to do these bcls and that's great.
Christina: Yeah. So do you have to be certified
Alyssa: to
Christina: do A,
Alyssa: B,
Christina: CL? How do you learn how to do this?
Monica: Yeah, so it does take some education. Obviously there are some online classes if you want to become like A BCL certified scorer. Um. But you know, there's an expense to that. And even here on campus, um, I've created a kind of standardized operating procedure for how to, um, [00:17:00] get involved in the bcls and, uh, get certified if you want to become certified as a scorer.
Um, a lot of this involves in any class, whether it's. You know, an online class or if you're learning through me, um, you're gonna be reviewing the definitions and the protocols of how to run the tests, um, and get really familiar with those 52 items that I talked about. Uh, you're also gonna wanna do some shadowing, um, and practice on maybe employee pet dogs or dogs that don't need an eval, but we'd like to just practice, um, before you really get into the nitty gritty of doing it with the real.
Dogs with that real pressure. Um, and then you also wanna do self review to make sure, to make sure that you're not getting any bad habits that could negatively impact, um, how the dog is being, uh, evaluated. Um, and specifically if you wanna be a scorer, um, not only is there coursework, but there's also an exam that you can take.
So the International Association for Animal Behavior [00:18:00] Consultants. Does have a BCL exam that you can take, uh, it's about $65 and you can take it from the comfort of your own home. So I did it in my pajamas.
Alyssa: Always the best way to work. Yeah,
Monica: always the best way. Yep. Um, and so, you know, once you take that, then you are certified, but it only lasts for about two years.
So every two years you are gonna have to re-certify. Yeah. So it's, it's, it's a lot. So that's why I also host a lot of biannual kind of workshops where we get together with anyone who is certified on campus, whether that's a volunteer or an employee, and we just practice together in a room to make sure that if we were to take that exam again tomorrow, that we would still pass and we'd have good inter observer reliability.
Christina: Yeah, and I'm sure as the data grows, things are probably going to change too with it. The bcls and all of that.
Alyssa: Yeah. The process. I mean, everything has to get bigger, I guess.
Christina: Yeah,
Monica: yeah. It does. It does take a huge village because again, collecting this take this data takes a lot of people. Um, and so I really wanna take a [00:19:00] moment to shout out to some of my volunteers who have been with me for over a year.
Um, I won't say their full name just in case they're shy. Um, but I will say huge, huge. So much love to Deb. Larry, Brenda, Sue and Holly, you guys know who you are. I could not get to where I am so far in this process without you guys supporting me, uh, through, so thanks for that.
Timothy: Well, this is just the proof that Leader Dog is put trying to put out the.
Best off they can with all this, all this other new technology that's come along and now this new BCL.
Alyssa: Yeah, it's, it's honestly super incredible. I know I talk to Monica all the time outside of work and, and as much as I tell her, Hey, we should talk about non-work things, it, it tends to always find its way back to bcl.
So it is nice to now have kind of this, this formal little. Education piece on it, so I really appreciate it. Monica, thank you so much for being here, and thank you to everybody for listening to the Taking the Lead podcast. Again, I'm Alyssa Otis, and my hosts with me are [00:20:00] Timothy Kyo and Christina Hepner.
We hope you enjoy the learning about the new behavior checklist and the important role that Monica plays is the data coordinator. Please join us next time as we continue to dive into the world of blindness.
Christina: And if you'd like to learn more about applying to our free services at Leader Dog, you can head to leader dog.org or call us at (888) 777-5332.
Don't forget you can reach us at taking the lead@leaderdog.org with any questions or ideas. If you like today's podcast, make sure to hit subscribe and check us out wherever Podcast Stream.