On Take Your Kid to Work Day I visited the Coquitlam Animal Shelter to gain more awareness about the stray and abandoned animals in our community. Darra Evans, an Animal Shelter Attendant and Info Clerk was the one who sacrificed her work break to give me a tour and explain her job at the animal shelter. Since this year’s TOKTWD focus is the work environment here’s what I observed and felt about the Coquitlam Animal Shelter, as well as something really interesting I learned from Darra.
Hear, see, smell, and feel: This work environment somewhat resembles our school but in the form of a small animal shelter. Inside and out, its architecture leaves much to be desired. Ugly support beams and fluorescent lights are prominent, and it has portables. The furniture and décor, in the lobby and office are non-descript. One pleasant thing about the design of this work environment is there are many big windows letting in natural light and that it has high ceilings. You will commonly see cages, toys, lots of windows, and animal food in the rooms where the animals are kept.
The annoying sound of fluorescent light vibrations are quite noticeable everywhere. In the office and foyer, we hear the phone ringing, the receptionist, people coming and going with their requests. Although I was not allowed to visit the dogs, I could often hear the distant sound of dogs barking. In the cat rooms, we hear meowing, purring, hissing, and growling. In the rabbit and guinea pig portable, you hear gnawing, scratching, and burrowing.
Motivation: A nice part of the work environment is the Riverview Park Forest just across the street, where they take their dogs for walks. The best part of this work environment is all the adorable animals in it. It’s very hard for your heart not to melt when you’re surrounded by these poor animals that have been abused or abandoned.
Discouragement: Being surrounded by animals and helping them find loving homes and helping people in the community find the right animal to adopt would probably be a huge motivation for me if I worked here. Having time outdoors in the forest with the dogs is also motivating. The people who work here seem to be very kind with everyone.
Environment: The work environment on the other hand? I have one sentence. I find the architecture, décor, and fluorescent lighting not very motivating.
One interest: Something that I find both fascinating and concerning is that Coquitlam is in the middle of an animal hoarding problem, with people taking in too many cats to take care of them properly and to get them spayed and neutered, causing a lot of kittens to currently end up in shelters. Animal Shelter Attendant, Darra Evans, taught me more about our community’s animals and how to take care of them. One thing I found really interesting is I learned from her that a big part of her job involves learning to communicate with each animal and this starts with learning to understand its body language and its individual sensitivities, likes, dislikes, and personality.
