Your participation matters. ECAD is so thankful for volunteers, shoppers, donors and sponsors who help us in our mission to enable greater independence for people living with disabilities. 

• Volunteer ECAD's specially educated canines change lives everyday, by volunteering, you can help change lives too! We welcome families and individuals of all ages to get involved.
  Home for the Weekend | Other Volunteer Opportunities
  
  
• Shop 
  • Through our Amazon Wish List, you can order and ship items ECAD needs for the dogs, clients and the offices. 
• Attend an Event
  • Upcoming: Graduation
  • Check out our Events Page for more opportunities 

Breeding

Service Dogs must have exceptional health, abilities, and temperaments. ECAD's founders, Dale and Lu Picard, have developed an outstanding breeding program, as well as a strong network within the industry to uphold the highest standards for the service dog breeds we raise and train. With the exception of some breeder donations, our dogs are Labrador and Golden Retrievers bred by ECAD for outstanding physical and mental health. We take pride in the fact that we have owned all of our female breeders from birth, and we only use studs from other Service Dog programs to ensure the continued strength, stability, and excellence of our service dog breeds.We carefully select females that have even tempers, good learners, and superior health to breed for ECAD.  Our males are confident, excellent health, with a sweet personality.  Each female will have no more than 4 litters in their lifetime and then go on to be exceptional ambassadors for us. On a yearly bases ECAD will whelp between 3 to 5 litters, all with the purpose of becoming Assistance Dogs.

Having our own breeding program helps to ensure the best possible puppies enter our training program. The puppies are whelped at our breeding center in Torrington, Connecticut by the Picard family. ECAD’s early education and socialization program stands the test of time.  Between our Puppy Nanny Program and early exposures to various noises, textures, and objects while still in the whelping box, ECAD has a 85% or better success rate. 

Training

Our program is unique because the pups get the best of both worlds – home and school – right from the start. We are big believers in early education!

Nursery Team

As early as eight weeks of age, the pups are ready to start their journey to become a Service Dog with their Nursery team. The nursery teams are loving people that open their homes and hearts for several months in order to expose their pup to traveling in vehicles, household activities, as well as parks, trails and any place a pet dog can go. Thanks to these amazing volunteers, these Service Dogs in training are begining their well rounded education.

ECADemy

Once the puppies are ready to leave their Nursery Team, they are welcomed into the ECADemy Program.

The ECADemy program: Intermediate Phase focuses on additional socialization of the Service Dogs in Training, visiting places pet dogs are not welcomed. For example, movies, resturants, malls, etc. By the end of the intermediate phase, each dog will have learned up to 60 commands that can be combined to perform even more tasks of daily living designed to help a person with a disability. 

The ECADemy program: Advanced Phase is all about customizing the Service Dog in Trainings skills to meet the clients individual needs. By the time the client comes for team training, each Service Dog has received up to 1500 hours of education and socialization.

ECAD's Canine Magic is a specialized program offering Service Dogs for children with autism, helping families build independence and confidence. ECAD is one of the few accredited service dog providers that accepts children with autism as young as two years old.

These dogs assist a child with Autism in areas of social, emotional, and cognitive development, but the dog's primary duty is to increase the child's physical safety by "anchoring". Anchoring is a method in which the dog wears a harness that is attached to the child's belt. The child also holds the harness and is taught to walk with the dog, but a third party facilitator (usually a parent or teacher) holds a second leash attached to the dog's collar. The parent can then give the dog a command to "stay" if the child becomes distracted, frustrated, or tries to bolt away, enabling the child to function well in situations that were previously impossible to handle.

Eligibility:

The caregiver and child must

• Be willing and able to travel to our training center in Connecticut for interviews and a 13-day Team Training.
• Demonstrate they can put into practice the information they have learned in Team Training.
• Develop a bond with their Service Dog and perform safely as a team in public.
• The child must be less than or equal to 70 pounds in weight.
• In need of a Service Dog to assist in activities of daily living due to some type of physical restriction.
• Accepting of his or her disability.
• Able to commit to uphold the training for the life of the dog.
• Able to show that he or she has the appropriate environment and resources to properly care for a dog.

Education:

Primary caregivers must attend a 13-day team training where they are educated through lectures, dog handling drills, and community field trips. Their child joins them for the last 3 to 4 days of training to create the integrated Team of three: caregiver as the primary handler, child and Service Dog. During Team Training, attendees have the option to stay on-site in shared lodging.

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