THERAPY ANIMALS OF SAN ANTONIO INC

• Sustain and expand targeted animal assisted activity and therapy services, as well as related education and consultation, to Bexar County
and its 9 surrounding counties
• Increase the success of persons who join Therapy Animals of San Antonio who work toward becoming a therapy team and support their
development as new visiting teams once they are registered to better serve the community
• Ensure ongoing best practices in training, evaluation of teams, and in service, including continuing education of current members
• Provide strong stewardship of the organization as it enters its 30th year of community service
. To continue to provide crisis response as needed, including keeping teams trained and certified according to national standards and FEMA.

- Maintain TASA assessment of organizations / facilities requesting therapy team services and formalized agreements with them to best
meet everyone’s needs; including point of contact to support ongoing quality engagement
- Prioritize requests for therapy team visits to maximize service to vulnerable populations where the benefits of the human animal bond
may be most effectively realized
- Grow/expand facility specific programs where compatible goals exist and organizational support for therapy teams is strong allowing greater breadth and depth of service
- Increase targeted community education away from general “filler / feel good presentations” and toward scientifically based presentations for professional bodies, organizations and conferences as well as for issue specific animal / humane topic presentations
- partner with community dog obedience and socialization training programs to build their knowledge of the expectations of therapy animal teams and to strengthen referrals of potential teams to them for training and reciprocally referral of persons they train who are interested in therapy work to us
- Provide ongoing access to an online training manual for all potential therapy teams with a critical knowledge based exam prior to classroom training to ensure essential knowledge of each potential team member
- Refocus classroom time spent with potential team members from knowledge to application (addressing specific skill readiness activities for therapy team evaluation success, therapy team evaluation demonstration, and role play)
- Strengthen facility matching for new teams
- Online training manual and classroom based StoryTails course
- Initiate training program for new therapy team evaluators that includes defined experience requirements, a continually accessible online training manual, community based observations and application of human animal assessment knowledge, classroom training, role play and mentored evaluation experiences.
- Maintain invited membership in the International Association of Human Animal Interaction Organizations for current best practices, research data, and future animal and service issues under consideration
- Follow national standards & address changes in policies & practices by therapy team educators & evaluators
- Build program of in-services that address areas of member development
- Ensure ongoing compliance with 501(c)3 requirements
- Align budget with goals & plan strategically so expenses are fully supported by revenue
- Provide estate planning information to support Therapy Animals of San Antonio
- Continue to partner with Fiesta Commission to offer the Annual Fiesta Pooch Parade in April
- Continue to populate the Board of Directors with diverse experts and community members to support well considered decisions
- attain and sustain GuideStar Platinum status
- seek grants and funding sources as appropriate and available
- Provide formal Annual Report to all members and donors

Membership: 2021- 148 members
Therapy Team Educators: 2021 - 3
Therapy Team Evaluators: 2021 - 5
Board: 13 members, each leading a component of the organization's operations
Office: Stable long-term lease office space, classroom, evaluation and storage area with permanent mailing address
Electronic Volunteer Management System: facilitates communication, record keeping, reporting for daily operations, as well as member access
to bylaws, policies, forms, facility information, online training etc.
Public Website: www.therapyanimalssa.org provides community education, access to forms for joining, contributing, evaluation, etc. as well as
calendar of events, news about services, etc.
Active Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/therapyanimalsa
Strong community support through donations, grants and annual fundraiser (Fiesta Pooch Parade)

Through 2021:
- Growing membership
- Strengthened Therapy Team Training Program, including creating online course with training video - ongoing
- Increase in potential teams tested in 2021 and increased success rate
- Successful new Therapy Team Evaluator Training Program implemented 2018
- Helped PetSmart to add a Therapy Dog training course to their dog training
options - continuing that relationship through mutual referrals and communication
- Expanding services to vulnerable populations through addition of new facilities
- Sustaining & expanding relationships with our 10 county region as services grow in
scope (justice system & local shelters, life skills, schools)
- Established an estate planning link & membership education link to resources
- Formalized annual report (2014 forward) for donor & public distribution/increased
transparency
- Ran successful Annual Fiesta Pooch Parade in 2022
- Attained the only regional affiliate status with the International Association of Human
Animal Interaction Organizations Nov 2014 - kept current
- Consultation / Presentations to various professional organizations / Conferences
Media / Community Service Presentations:
Recipient of grants and stipends
What’s next:
- Expand office capacity over the next few years as we grow
- Annual Pooch Parade in 2023
- Continue to expand and improve our CARE program to meet the needs of potential community crisis events with
trained and experienced teams (shootings, natural disasters, etc.)
- Create short video clips for use in various venues to increase education related to the human-animal bond