Family Dogs at Elementary Schools

Family Dogs at Elementary Schools

For any of you who have or have had a child at elementary school, you might be familiar with the common place sighting of family dogs accompanied by children’s parents. More and more families, I observe, are bringing the family dog for pick up and drop off at school.  I sense a lot of confidence in the owners.

Is it done out of genuine inclusion?  It’s the family dog and therefore deserves to participate in sending the child off to school and picking the child up at the end of their day.

Is it out of necessity for the owner? Perhaps to fit the dog’s walk in while they multitask the many child-related activities they need to do in an amazingly short day, not to mention adult responsibilities that need to get done also.

Is it convenience?  The owner was going to walk with the children to school so why not take the dog too?

Or just because they have a dog and want everyone to know about it?

In any case, it seems to be getting more and more common place.  Every year, I see more and more family dogs curiously following the family as the children get dropped off at school.  So far – so lucky.  I have not observed anything worrisome at anytime.  But I am very curious about this trend.  I notice families have all kinds of dogs, it varies.  Some have large dogs, Labrador Retrievers and Golden Retrievers and large mixed breeds.  Other families have small dogs.  I see little terriers being carried in the mother’s purse or skipping along between a young child’s feet.  Even being carried by a child or parent as the rest of the family walks along.

But it has occurred to me more than once, that although this looks fun and it is all very ideal; it seems to happen all unspoken.  I never hear about any kind of “rules” or regulations regarding taking the dog to school while taking the children to school.  I have also observed though, that as a common courtesy most families do have the dogs leashed.  At the same time I have not observed any signs on specific school grounds that indicate this should be done.  So this leaves me very interested in the occurrence of dogs at school like it is a passively unspoken entitlement that people will continue unless directly advised otherwise.

So my next question is are we okay with this?  It is common for children to have a fear of dogs. And here we have dogs close to children in a public area.  People also have allergies to dogs, should this be taken into consideration?  And a facility such as a school, dedicated to looking out for students, should be proactive about anticipating dogs on the premises and should have some kind of signage – any signage at all would be a start, so that more awareness is openly shared between families with dogs and families without dogs and school expectations.

Do you think family dogs should be on school grounds for children pick up and drop off?

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