Episode 7: Healing Through Horses: Horsemanship for Heroes

Summary

This podcast episode features a discussion about the Horsemanship for Heroes program, which utilizes equine therapy to support veterans and emergency responders in their healing journey. We explore the program's structure, its impact on participants, and the collaboration with Purdue University for research purposes. They emphasize the importance of the human-horse bond and the community built around the program, highlighting the mutual benefits of their partnership.

Keywords

Horsemanship for Heroes, equine therapy, veterans support, human-animal bond, Purdue University, College of Veterinary Medicine, community partnerships, mental health, trauma recovery, equine assisted psychotherapy, research collaboration

Takeaways

• Horsemanship for Heroes is a 16-week program focused on equine therapy for veterans.
• The program consists of two phases: ground work and riding.
• Equine assisted psychotherapy empowers participants to heal from trauma.
• The collaboration with Purdue University College of Veterinary Medicine enhances the program's credibility and research.
• Participants report significant improvements in mental health and community connection.
• The program fosters a strong sense of community among veterans and responders.
• The human-horse bond is a powerful tool for healing and personal growth.
• Feedback from participants is crucial for program development and improvement.
• The partnership allows for data collection to validate the program's effectiveness.
• Continuity of care is emphasized, encouraging past participants to return as volunteers.

Chapters

00:00   Introduction to the Podcast and Guests

00:43   Overview of Horsemanship for Heroes Program

02:53   The Mission and Structure of the Program

05:37   The Partnership Formation and Collaboration

12:24   Research and Data Collection Insights

14:44   Mutual Benefits of the Partnership

17:36   Building a Successful Relationship

19:23   Building Trust and Communication

21:45   Impactful Outcomes of Collaboration

23:34   The Healing Power of Horses

26:23   Sustainability and Community Engagement

28:30   Lightning Round Insights

31:24   Personal Stories of Transformation

32:59   Connecting with the Community

Important Links

Horsemanship for Heroes

Human-Animal Partnerships and Interactions (HAPI) Lab 

Transcript

Sandra San Miguel 
Welcome to We're Engaged, the podcast that features Purdue University College of Veterinary Medicine's community partnerships. I'm your host, Sandy San Miguel the Associate Dean for Engagement. If you're new to the podcast, thanks for joining. And if you're a regular, welcome back. We're really excited to share with you all of the wonderful partnerships that Purdue Veterinary Medicine has. We wanna inspire you to either join in on these partnerships or start your own. And today, drum roll.

We are highlighting our partnership with Horsemanship for Heroes. Hi everybody.

Leanne Nieforth 
Hello!

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
Hello.

Sandra San Miguel 
Thanks so much for being on the show. I'm gonna go around or you can go around and let's introduce ourselves. Tell us about yourself and your program.

Scott Hooper 
That's that! That's that Leanne!

Leanne Nieforth 
I can start. Sure. So my name is Dr. Leanne Nieforth. I'm an assistant professor of human-animal interaction at the Center for the Human-Animal Bond within the College of Vet Med. And I study all things human-animal interaction. So working with humans and canines. And then, of course, what we're highlighting today, working with humans and equine.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper
My name is Kay Hooper. I'm the co-founder and executive director for Horsemanship for Heroes in Reno, Nevada. I am a veteran in the U.S. Army, 23 years, multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, and got involved with our program, love our horses and what they can do with their human-horse bond. And we're here just helping veterans, emergency responders, and their families heal.

I'm Scott Hooper, I'm Kay's husband and co-founder as well for Gainsmanship for Heroes. And I've also retired U.S. Army 26 plus years and multiple combat deployments just like Kay. And together we discovered the magic of the Human Horse Bond and never looked back from there and realized that we could do something with this.

Scott Hooper
Scott Hooper, I'm Kay's husband and co-founder as well for Horsemanship for Heroes. And I'm also a retired US Army, 26 plus years and multiple combat deployments is just like Kay. And together we discovered the magic of the human-horse bond and...

never looked back from there and realized that we could do something with this, with our own horses that would help address trauma. so we just jumped in, started, and a couple of years later, we're up and running and going, things are going wonderful. So it's exciting to be with these amazing animals and helping our heroes heal. And it's just incredible what the outcomes have been so far.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
with our own horses that would help address trauma. so we just jumped in, started, and a couple of years later, we're up and and going. Things are going wonderful. So it's exciting to be with these amazing animals and helping our heroes and it's just incredible how it comes to this so far.

Sandra San Miguel 
This is wonderful. And before we go any further, I want to thank you both for your service. Very, very much appreciate it for everything you've done and everything you're doing now and in the future.

Sandra San Miguel 
Can you tell us about Horsemanship for Heroes? Just describe the program, what's your mission and why is this so important?

Karolyn And Scott Hooper
So horsemanship for heroes is a two phased 16 week total program. So we've got our phase one, the first eight weeks where our participants come for 90 minute sessions once a week. And phase one is pretty much ground focused and we're very much just focused on establishing the bond with the horses, introducing, you know, some of our, some of our participants have never been around.

horses before and some have. So we start from the very beginning on safety and how horses communicate and basically, you know, how to we'll teach them how to groom a horse and how to lead a horse. And we start from the most elemental things gradually working our way up through those eight weeks, doing things like round pinning and and and obstacle courses and all of it designed for our horses.

and our heroes to establish a bond together in a relationship. We do do grounding exercises and mindfulness throughout the courses and then at the end of that first eight weeks we we put our heroes into the saddle and let them experience what it's like to be on a horse and then we offer a second phase which is another eight weeks of riding so the person the people can do just walk for the entire eight weeks or they can get all the way up to

Lope, is a pretty fast gate. It's really up to them. I think the fundamental thing about our program is the clientele that we're dealing with are people that we understand. They want to be challenged. They want to be independent. And so we make sure that our program is designed to give them just that.

Scott Hooper 
And Kay nailed it. so a couple other things. So we use equine assisted psychotherapy and learning to achieve our results, which is really empowering our participants, our heroes to be self-sustaining, get the more established trust to be able to interact better at home. And during the process, our curriculum is the same.

Scott Hooper 
as far as what the horse we use horsemanship as the vehicle to get us to the end state, which is a healing within each individual and everybody's path is a little bit different. Um, but, but they all find a way to get to a spot where they're very comfortable. so regardless of what's happening, we, uh, the focus is on what's happening inside the tool that we use in the vehicle is teaching horsemanship.

Sandra San Miguel 
Excellent. So tell us about how you all got together.

Leanne Nieforth 
Sure, so I can take, yeah, I can take this one. So in 2023, we were both at a PATH conference, so the PATH International Annual Conference in North Carolina. PATH International is the professional association of therapeutic coursemanship, which Kay and Scott neglected to mention that they just received huge accreditation as a premier accredited center, which is a huge undertaking and a huge honor. So congrats to them on that.

Sandra San Miguel
Like, how did you meet?

Sandra San Miguel 
Congratulations.

Leanne Nieforth
Yes, big deal. So we were at the conference and Kay and Scott were presenting about their program. So I went to their talk, sat through their presentation and where they talked about kind of why they were doing what they were doing, what their mission was, what their vision was for the program, as well as kind of highlighted the manualization of their programs. So unlike some programs where each session is kind of

know, determined on that day or the goals are set for that day, their program is really well laid out. So each week has a very specific purpose and very specific activities for what happens. And as a researcher, I was sitting in the room saying, wow, this is really fascinating. Here we have a really well designed program with individuals who, you know, have a long history themselves in the armed forces, as well as working with horses. And they're providing these services to

other heroes. And in that they were talking about the impact that their program had had thus far and the outcomes that they were seeing. And I was really impressed and excited to go up afterwards and talk to them and introduce myself and say, you have no idea who I am. However, I'm really impressed with your program. And we should definitely talk about partnership moving into the future. So we ended up connecting after the conference, and then talking about kind of how we could work together and how we could kind of design a project.

and future studies to really measure the impact of what they were doing already really successfully.

Sandra San Miguel
I this. I loved hearing all the stories of how people connect. So tell me how you combine your superpowers. What do you each bring to the table?

Karolyn And Scott Hooper
So first of all, when we did meet Leanne and she came up to us, we were absolutely thrilled because we see the value of having a research-based collaboration and for it to be Purdue University just is absolutely incredible with y'all's reputation. And so we were thrilled for that. We also know that Equine Assisted Services still has a ways to go when it comes to proving efficacy and

and proving to the greater medical community out there that it is an effective, proven program.

for us to be part of that and to be able to partner with Ligand to provide that proof is again, absolutely thrilling for us. So we kind of got our, we had a very interesting start to our program. We had retired from the army in 2016 out in Western North Carolina. And then right around COVID time made the move out here to Reno. And we got our first horse.

as a kid, I'm from Texas originally, I told Scott, if we're gonna move to Reno, I finally get to have horses. so our horse Latte, who is an integral part of our program, and Leanne's got lots of stories about her, he arrived, she was two and a half years old, and she arrived off the transport sick. And I...

Sandra San Miguel
You have to!

Leanne Nieforth 
Okay.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
didn't know what was going on. saw her standing there and she was lethargic and she wasn't the horse that I knew from, she came from Olive Branch, Mississippi. And so I called the breeder and I said, hey Rita, there's something wrong with latte. And she said, well, Kate, did you take her temperature? And I was like, and I very rapidly realized, and this is horrible, but I really, knew how to ride. I knew how to clean a stall. I knew all of that stuff, but.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper
I didn't fully appreciate what was involved in proper care and management of a horse. And so I jumped on, I was on Facebook and I saw this ad from Post University out of Connecticut for an equine studies degree and I had some leftover GI Bill. So I decided, well, let me just take a couple of classes. And I ended up loving it. It was like you finally study something that you just.

really absolutely enjoy it, especially in your 50s, suddenly it just means something completely different. And while I was doing that, I was introduced to Equine Assisted Services and specifically focused on the veteran population. And so I went to Scott and I told him about it. And in the meantime, he's going to take over on the story.

Leanne Nieforth 
you

Scott Hooper
Okay, in the meantime, so I had been daily taking and turning our horse latte out into our pasture and going on walks with her and establishing a relationship with her, which was really, really fascinating. And during that time also, I think for Kay and I, it was really the first time in our lives, at least adult lives, that we had the opportunity to really relax.

Leanne Nieforth
You

Scott Hooper 
to not be in charge of a bunch of people, both of us or either of us and just really have to worry about ourselves and our property. so while that was going on, I think my mind started to relax and Kay would look at me in the morning and say, do you know you had a nightmare last night? And I say, no, don't. Do you remember this? You said this.

Leanne Nieforth
you

Scott Hooper
So those started to accelerate and to the point where, DT Joe, jumped out of bed last night. No, I didn't. And so what was actually happening was my mind was relaxing and I was starting to have flashbacks and reliving trauma from my combat experiences overseas. Well, so obviously I don't want a pillow between myself and my wife. So I go to get help.

But the thing that made it most unique was while this is happening and I'm spending time with Latte our horse, I started to really connect with her and felt something special. And so I went to Kay and I told her there's something happening with Latte. I don't know what it is, but it feels incredible. And I think she is really helping me without me knowing what help I need. But it's just, I feel safe and

and she is like understanding me.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper
And so as part of my degree, I ended up focusing on that. I developed the curriculum for horsemanship for heroes. I had to do a big literary review on equine assisted psychotherapy and got into the actual research piece of it to understand what was going on out there. So I think we kind of came into it with an appreciation for the value of research and for what we're doing. And then a personal appreciation for the power of the human horse bond.

And so when we met super power Leanne, was it was just almost like it was totally meant to be.

Leanne Nieforth 
you

Sandra San Miguel 
beautiful. I love this. so tell us, Leanne, how are you interacting with the program? What do you bring into the table from Purdue?

Leanne Nieforth 
Yeah.

Leanne Nieforth 
Sure. So from Purdue, I just want to acknowledge the, you know, they just shared their story and I think that that's a really unique story in the story of Equine Assisted Services. A lot of individuals are providing services without the personal experience necessarily. So that's something that is a huge, huge strength of their program. And, you know, as we have done the project, which I'll describe momentarily, has shown through the data, you know,

in a very, very bright manner. But yeah, so from Purdue's side, we are partnered right now. We have just finished year one of data collection on a study looking at the psychosocial impacts of the horsemanship-focused Equine Assisted Learning Program. So we are looking at veterans, emergency responders, and family members who go through either phase one or phase two of their program and looking at

clinically validated responses to surveys related to psychosocial health and wellbeing at pre, post, and then three months follow-up. And we're also in that process doing some in-depth qualitative interviews. So we're not only seeing kind of the clinically validated measures, but we're also doing in-depth interviews to understand kind of what changes we're seeing and why. And then we're also doing weekly check-ins using what's called the PANAS, which looks at

mood, negative and positive affect, kind of how that changes throughout the program across the participants. So these are questions that Kay and Scott and I had had from the beginning and when we started kind of discussing what our partnership would look like, we decided to kind of start here and then kind of throw in some different things kind of as we move forward. So this is really a pilot study.

Like I said, we just finished year one of data collection. We're going to do another year just to build some statistical power in our numbers. But thus far, results have been really exciting. So we're thrilled to be working together and to be kind of giving Kay and Scott the data that's helping them kind of make decisions in the future, develop their program, but also validate their program and what they're doing.

Sandra San Miguel 
Excellent. Well, thank you all for sharing part of this podcast. Well, the podcast was born to not just highlight these amazing programs like yours, but to also help other people develop university and community partnerships. And one aspect of those partnerships is that they're mutually beneficial. So can you each say how you've benefited from the partnership?

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
I would say from my perspective, just having that external look, having somebody that's able to provide the instruments to collect the data and then actually interpret that data to show us that we are having an effect on people is just really invaluable. We get feedback every day from the participants that come through.

But sometimes you wonder, well, are they just saying that? And so when they actually speak to a researcher like Leanne, and she knows all the right questions to ask, I think the results are just that much more powerful. So yeah.

Leanne Nieforth
you

Leanne Nieforth 
Awesome. I think from my end, I think the fact that the program was so intentionally developed and has this manualized curriculum, I think that's really amazing on the research side because a lot of time and effort went into creating that and it works for them and their programs. So as a researcher, when I identify programs that have these types of curriculums,

It's definitely of interest to me to kind of look into them further so that, you know, maybe someday this can be replicated, you know, in whatever capacity that may be so that the same outcomes could be more accessible for veterans, you know, either with, you know, Greater Reno or, you know, Greater US to kind of figure out how we can best implement these programs for military and first responders.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
And I'm just going to add one thing to that, Sandra. So the fact that we have a writing component is kind of unique because a lot of the programs out there are ground-based only. And we've been asking our participants, know, in the term surveys, what did you think was, because you have to go through phase one before you go through phase two. So was phase two as effective? you have as much of an impact on you?

And the responses we're getting is that it does because when you're sitting on the horse as opposed to standing next to the horse, it's a whole different type of connection that you have to have with that beautiful animal. And so hopefully in the future we can really look at that to see, know, to kind of promulgate that out there as well, that having a riding component with this population of people is actually a really positive thing and that it doesn't have to

just on the ground.

Sandra San Miguel 
Thank you. I can tell you all have a really great relationship. So can you share with us what makes your relationship so successful?

Leanne Nieforth 
You

Leanne Nieforth 
Did you unmute? I was going say go for it Scott.

Sandra San Miguel 
Hehehehehe

Scott Hooper 
So our relationship is wonderful because we, one, I think there's a mutual respect between us, the three of us for the others and the professionalism, the determination, and really, think more than anything else, shared passion for what we're doing. And that is something that Kay and I love about working with Leanne is she's passionate about it. She will give us feedback.

We were fortunate enough for her to be able to come out here for a conference that she had to attend and reel her into our barn just so she could meet the herd and you could just see her face light up with the horses and that's the way we are. And so we have a mutual respect for both the animals that we love as well as our population that we're serving and to us it's all about service.

Leanne Nieforth 
Yeah

Scott Hooper 
And it's just, it's nice to be with somebody that can tell us maybe not what we want to hear if necessarily, but to help course correct if necessary. And we have full autonomy to do just that.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
And I gotta say that it's so impressive that Leanne is so available. And I don't just mean to the participants too. She hands out her cell phone and she's like, call me whenever you can. And she does everything she can in order to make it easier on them to provide the feedback for this research project. And I don't know if everybody is like that. don't guess they are. So just her willingness to just kind of put her person

Leanne Nieforth 
Bye.

Leanne Nieforth 
Yeah.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
life, you know, not to the side, still take some pretty, pretty amazing steps to facilitate this is just so impressive. And we are just really, really blessed to have her.

Leanne Nieforth 
Yeah.

Leanne Nieforth 
thanks guys. Thanks guys. No, think from my perspective, think, know, Scott, you said mutual respect and my first thought was mutual respect and trust, right? And trust that, you know, we can communicate openly and course correct. I think that's something that I really value in our relationship too is when, you know, we're setting things up or discussing results or, you know, discussing next steps.

Sandra San Miguel 
Yeah, so are we. Leanne's pretty awesome.

Leanne Nieforth 
I know that you guys will course correct me as well or say, what are you doing? Or no, that's not true. Whatever is appropriate in that moment. know that that line of communication is open and I really appreciate that because I think you guys are the experts in what you're doing and it's my job to capture that and to speak into it, but just like you're speaking into the research side.

very much enjoy working with you guys and all your participants are awesome too, which is definitely a perk. I very much enjoy the interviews and the contact that I have with all of them.

Sandra San Miguel 
follow up. This is great. How often do y'all communicate and what's your favorite mode of communication?

Leanne Nieforth
Thanks for watching!

Leanne Nieforth 
think it depends. Scott, we didn't hear you. You were muted. no.

Scott Hooper 
Face to face, think you need to make quarterly visits and that works out great. I'm sure the university will appreciate that.

Leanne Nieforth 
Hey, no, I would love quarterly visits. That would be awesome. I think more realistically, it depends on kind of where we are on the project. We have cohorts. So I think depending upon where we are within the cohort is when we check in more, if there's opportunities to present together, for example, at future conferences, know, what local contact then. But I think in terms of how we communicate,

We communicate in all different ways via email, via Zoom call, via text message, via phone call, dependent upon kind of the timeliness of what we need to discuss. And that's something that I really appreciate being able to kind of jump from one communication tactic to another, knowing that, you know, I'm not bothering them and they're not bothering me. And if we need to talk about something, it's relevant in that particular time. So call me or text me.

And I think that works out really well for us and kind of what we have going right now. But yes.

Sandra San Miguel 
Well, I've only experienced you all as a team for a few minutes, but I can't see how any outcome in the universe, any possibility that this team can't have truly impactful results. So, can you share some of the things that you have accomplished by working together? Some of those impacts?

Leanne Nieforth 
you

Leanne Nieforth 
Thank you.

Leanne Nieforth 
Sure, so from the research side, we're halfway through data collection. So right now I just have preliminary findings. So I can share briefly what those are, but they are preliminary and will change most likely given the increase in participant numbers. But we are seeing clinically significant change in multiple mental health outcomes, even though the program is not focused on mental health like a traditional couch therapy session would be, for example.

We are also seeing in the qualitative interviews, a theme that's emerging in probably greater than 75 % of interviews without prompting is related to something along the lines of, I would not be here without this program, or my friend would not be here without this program, which I think speaks very loudly to the success and the outcomes of the program.

I think more broadly speaking, we're seeing impacts of not only the horse-human bond, like Kay and Scott have talked about earlier, but also the importance of the people and the community that's being built in terms of the healing process. ultimately, that's kind of a sneak peek into what we're seeing, but we're really excited on both the clinically validated survey measures as well as the qualitative interviews.

to note kind of the overwhelmingly positive outcomes and interactions that these programs are facilitating in the healing journey of both military veterans and emergency responders.

Sandra San Miguel 
So to sum it up, you are saving lives. Not just changing lives, you're saving lives. That's incredible.

Leanne Nieforth 

Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Sandra San Miguel
Okay, I have a personal question before we get into the lightning round. There's actually two. How many horses are in the herd now? Does latte have company?

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
you

We have four horses in our herd. And I will say that when we first started, we did a pilot at a different facility just to kind of validate our program. And at one point we had nine participants and nine horses and nine volunteers out in this arena. And all I could say was it was a lot of legs. It was way too. And so when we started up again,

Sandra San Miguel 
Yeah

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
And again, we're heading on our second year, which so we're still pretty new. We decided that a smaller size was really important. And so our phase one, which is the ground piece is two to three people. I think this next term we've got, we're trying to maximize. So we've got three people in every class. And the feedback we got, cause we invited people that were part of the pilot to come back and do the program.

when we stood up horsemanship for heroes, was almost to a T. Everybody said it's so much better to have the smaller groups, that personal interaction, as opposed to the large numbers. So it makes it challenging because when we talk about research, we are trying to get larger numbers because that's what research wants. But in our case, really the only way we can do it is to do that over time. Hence our two-year...

research project. But we are at Four Horses. We have a Friesian named Oka, and she's beautiful. Everybody loves the big, beautiful black horses with all the hair. And then we have three, our three Gypsy Vaner horses. We love Gypsies because they are very social animals. They have a lot of personalities. They were bred to be that way, basically.

They're also gorgeous and they have a higher carrying capacity. And when you look at our clientele, we're not working with children. We're working with adults that have been spending a lot of time out in the gym. So we need horses that can carry higher weight. so that's why we've chosen basically to kind of go draft with them. And so we have Latay, Shahan and Growler who is only three years old.

Leanne Nieforth 
Thank

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
But he is a giant and everybody loves working with Growler because he's just a teenager, you know, and sometimes you need that kind of frustration built into the program too.

Sandra San Miguel
You

Leanne Nieforth 
Hehehehe

Sandra San Miguel 
Excellent. And I don't know if you would know this, how many of your heroes that have come through after coming through your program have gotten horses of their own?

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
That's a great question. We actually really tried to dissuade them from doing that because horses are very expensive and we have this thing. So after you finish your phase two, we want to make sure that we're not one of these programs that's like, okay, here's your certificate of graduation or in our case, you get a belt buckle. And, good luck because the reason this works is because of the horses. It's the magic of the horses. So we have what we call continuity of care.

Leanne Nieforth 
Yeah.

Sandra San Miguel 
that's great.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
where we invite everybody to come back and be volunteers for the next group of people coming through. And over 85 % of our participants come back to do just that because they want to help the next group experience. I know it's so rewarding. So we're growing from within. We have an instructor track too. We've got several of our folks trying to get Equine Specialists in Mental Health and Learning Certification. We have a color guard that we go out in town and do outreach events with.

Leanne Nieforth 
you

Leanne Nieforth
Thank

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
And we're really excited. This winter in April, we're going to be competing in the Northern Nevada Gypsy Fest in Winnemucca. And we're fielding with our horses a horsemanship for heroes team where our participants will show the horses both on the ground and in the saddle. And if they win something, they get to keep the ribbon. it just gives more. It's all about providing contact with the horses.

Leanne Nieforth 
you

Leanne Nieforth 
Okay.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper (35:03.892)
But right now, I don't think anyone's bought a horse yet, but there are probably at least four people talking about it. And again, we're working on telling them just come back to our place.

Leanne Nieforth (35:09.475)
you

Sandra San Miguel 
This is so much better. This is so beautiful for sustainability and for scaling in a way that maintains the relationships and the mission and the personalization. Like everybody has a stake in it. I love it. Leanne told me this was outstanding.

Leanne Nieforth 
Thank you.

Leanne Nieforth 
you

Leanne Nieforth 
Not many hold on to their participants that long. And I think, you know, in the interviews, that's a huge, huge highlight is again, that community that's built and that continuity of care and knowing that they have a place where they belong and can always kind of go back to that.

Sandra San Miguel 
Right

Yeah.

Sandra San Miguel 
outstanding. Okay, ready for the lightning round?

Leanne Nieforth 
Ready?

Sandra San Miguel 
You can't think about this first one, okay? I'm gonna spit it out and then shout out your answer. Okay. One word to describe your partnership. Ready, set, go.

Leanne Nieforth 
Excellent.

Scott Hooper 
Awesome.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
Trust.

Leanne Nieforth 
you

Sandra San Miguel
What's been the best part of the partnership?

Leanne Nieforth 
people.

Sandra San Miguel 
What surprised you most about working together?

Scott Hooper 
easy it is.

Leanne Nieforth 
I was going to say the growth and the motivation. They have made extreme growth and changes and all the time I hear about, well, somebody said we needed this, so we got it. Or like, we built a barn and we built an arena, which is of course a big deal, but it's super cool to see the motivation there. And even in the interviews I hear.

participants saying all the time, well, I mentioned this and next week it was there or they had heaters or they had water or whatever it may be.

Sandra San Miguel 
Okay, this is great. One piece of advice for others who want to develop a similar university community partnership.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
Don't be shy about doing something like this. It is very doable, especially if you've got a great partner like Leanne. And it's not a tremendous amount of work on our end at all, but it's still like helping the community as a whole.

Leanne Nieforth
think mine would be listen more than you speak in the beginning at least to really understand your partner and what they're doing so that you can kind of really help them and work together rather than push a research agenda or a university agenda on the partner.

Sandra San Miguel 
Thank you all so much. This just has been a beautiful episode and you are truly impacting our heroes. And I just can't thank you enough for sharing your story. This is amazing. And I expect some pictures. Can you provide some pictures that we could put up to market this episode?

Leanne Nieforth 
Yeah.

They have

Scott Hooper 
We could definitely do that. We have no shortage of pictures.

Sandra San Miguel 
Can we shanon? Plus I wanna see... Yeah, I need to see all the horses too. They sound gorgeous. Absolutely.

Leanne Nieforth
They're beautiful horses too. Awesome.

Scott Hooper
Sandra, can I say one more thing? don't know if it came out necessarily or not, so we've veterans, emergency responders, and then as Kay said up front, their families as well. And so we, I think have had three couples come through. so both veterans with their spouse, Reno SWAT officer with his spouse, and

And we've also had a Gold Star family come through. And the Gold Star family is a woman who had a one-year-old son. was four months pregnant with her second son and her husband was killed in Afghanistan back in 2000. goodness. Eleven, I think. the three of them, so the two boys and her came through the program together and it was the most powerful experience.

for them as a family, as well as for everybody that was a part of it. And when we operate, we have one horse, one volunteer, and the hero, and they are a team throughout. So we try to keep that team, particularly the volunteers and the bonds that are established in every class. But this one in particular, were just so meaningful to everyone. There were no dry eyes. It was amazing.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
And Sandra, I just wanted to add, sorry, you're like, come on. But one more thing too that I wanted to say was as far as the program ourselves and benefiting from having this partnership with Leanne, it's been tremendous. We were just on the front cover and we had a big article in Path International and we get to mention that we were doing this research. project. Can't talk about the results yet, but just the fact that we're doing it is tremendous. And we also just really recently had a meeting with a foundation that's very serious about providing us funding because we want to bring a contracted psychotherapist on board so that all of our sessions can be equine assisted psychotherapy as opposed to learning because we feel like that's the most beneficial thing.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
And the ability to state that we are in a research project with Purdue just gives us, I think, just that much more credibility to our program when it comes to foundations. And the person we were talking to was an educator too. So he was just all over that from UNR. So just as another side benefit to doing the research for program.


Sandra San Miguel 
You really are growing. This is incredible. So people who are watching, who are listening, how can they get in touch with you? How can they learn more about horsemanship for heroes? How can they learn more about you, Leanne, and what you bring to the table?

Leanne Nieforth 
Go for it, okay?

Karolyn And Scott Hooper
So we have a website it's a horsemanship the number four and then heroes Horsemanship4Heroes.org.  Scott and I wholeheartedly believe that there are so many veterans emergency responders people that are dealing with trauma that can use this help. we, you can't have enough of these programs and we will bend over backwards to like help people in telling them our story on how we established ourselves, you know, how to find the funding, how to find the participants, all that stuff. So we are an open book and if people want to contact us, we'd love to talk to them about it.

Leanne Nieforth 
Awesome.

Sandra San Miguel
Excellent, thank you.

Scott Hooper
But I think to add to that what K said to add to that is, is, and you asked this question earlier at some point I think, but the importance of, you know, everybody that gets into something like this has a passion for it and wants to help. But the value of having at a minimum a veteran or emergency responder as an advisor.

Karolyn And Scott Hooper 
to add to that. Okay.

Leanne Nieforth 
you

Scott Hooper 
that can be with the organization for the journey is so important because there's a culture aspect to what we do that you can't just, you can't pick up without having somebody there that understands it. And so it makes for a more comfortable space when working with your participants and in our case, our heroes. And I think it adds also validity to what you're doing.

Leanne Nieforth 
Thank

Sandra San Miguel
Absolutely.

Leanne Nieforth 
Awesome. And then if you want to contact me or learn more about my work, the Human-Animal Partnerships and Interactions Lab or the HAPI Lab, we have a website that is available through the Purdue Vet School website.

Sandra San Miguel
Well, thank you all. I'll put that information in the show notes as well. It's been a total pleasure. So for everybody tuning in, that's a wrap for us. If you like this episode, please subscribe, rate, and share it with your friends. And remember, together we can change the world. So use your powers for good.

Leanne Nieforth 
Thank you guys.

Sandra San Miguel 
That was beautiful. All right, don't jump off. I have to hit stop.