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Going into his fourth year volunteering with the Stanly County Humane Society, Isaac Cody, 17, of Albemarle, does everything from rehabilitating, vaccinating and transporting animals for adoption events, clinics and foster homes, to creating and maintaining the SCHS website, to helping veterinarians and doing fundraising and paperwork.
In the past four years, the society has helped lower the euthanization rates of dogs in the county’s animal control purview by 40 percent to 45 percent, and has expanded from kennels and a cage to a multi-foster-home rescue with its own facility, where about 700 adoptions happen every year, Cody says.
“I’ve always had an interest in animals, though it was never fully expressed until I began volunteering,” he says.
What’s been the hardest thing about the work? He’s seen euthanizations, “horrendous cruelty” and neglect.
“In all honesty, people are difficult to handle sometimes.” But his SCHS work “has not only prepared me for animal-related circumstances, but also social, economic, and simply life conflicts. For that reason, I would highly recommend any youth to do all that he/she can to remain active. Any activity/hobby can offer many more life lessons than one may originally believe.”
