On Wednesday, January 17, WIC hosted Pet Therapy with Marie-Pier Laniel in the Musacchio Learning Studio. Students booked a time to “Pause for Paws”, and took a moment to relax and have some fun before exams. There were dogs, a cat, bunnies and a ferret. The students` reaction to seeing animals at school was quite uplifting.
Pet therapy has been shown to help individuals relax and even reduce heart rate and blood pressure. Interacting with animals also helps calm breathing and relaxes the nervous system. Some of the students made comments themselves about how much better they felt at the end of their appointment and how it really did seem to alleviate some stress they had been experiencing.