College’s ‘audience dogs’ calm students
Student commencement speaker practices before pooch
Devon Wallick had written nine drafts of his commencement speech. He had recited it for his professor, delivered it to his roommate and practiced it in front a mirror “about 1,500 times.”
But Wallick, a 22-year-old about to finish a master’s degree in accounting, had not yet rehearsed in front of Dexter.
So on a recent Monday, he appeared at American University’s business school for an appointment with the pooch, an English springer spaniel with giant white paws, soulful brown eyes and floppy ears that are soft to the touch and, apparently, good speech listening devices.
“Who says I have to pick between a love of people and a love of numbers?” Wallick asked, kneeling to pet Dexter as he read from the address he would deliver that weekend to fellow graduate students at the Kogod School of Business. The dog, reclining on a leather bench, licked Wallick’s right hand until it glistened.
The saliva was, you might say, just part of Dexter doing his job. He is one of eight Washington-area canines on the business school’s roster of “audience dogs,” a volunteer corps whose main duties are to be attentive and nonjudgmental sounding boards for university students nervous about presentations they must eventually give to humans.
The program began last year and is thought to be the first of its kind at a U.S. university, said Caron Martinez, director of the Kogod Center for Business Communications. She is also the owner of one of the audience dogs, Reggie, an 11-year-old whom she describes as a “pinch-hitter.” Other team members are Ellie, a photogenic Bernese mountain dog who loves apples, and Noche, a black Pomeranian who looks like a tiny bear. All are “local, average” dogs with no special training, Martinez said.
Martinez cites research on the calming effects that dogs, even unfamiliar ones, can have on people, although she said she knows the science on this topic isn’t rock-solid. But the dozens of students who have participated — and any American University’ student with a presentation to deliver can book 30 minutes with a dog — have reported a notable decrease in nervousness on postsession surveys, she said. And besides, Martinez noted, the best way to ace a speech is to rehearse.
“How do you get students to practice? Any way you can,” she said. “Dog or no dog, that makes you a better public speaker.”
Wallick said that’s what he figured when he signed up. His speech had been chosen from among several submissions, and a few thousand people, his relatives included, were expected to be in the audience to hear it.
Dexter, of course, was just one dog. What help could he be? Rob Cheek, the graphic designer who owns him, said the pup’s lifelong love of people, plus a very focused gaze, are his strong suits.
The pair was recruited by Martinez after she spotted them walking on campus. Now, when they make the 10-minute walk from home to campus for an audience-dog session, Dexter is “tugging me, literally pulling my arm off, the entire ascent up Massachusetts Avenue,” toward the school, Cheek said.
But just in case Dexter needed extra motivation, a bag of chicken treats was on hand during Wallick’s appointment. Wallick briefly laughed during the first of two readings, and he later explained that was because the pooch “just looked completely uninterested in what I was doing.”
But overall, he thought it was helpful to be able to make light of what “has been a very serious process.”