Lifestyle

ASPCA program lets teenage girls learn leadership skills

Last fall, when 11-year-old Lola Tung was looking for an extracurricular activity to help her build her confidence and learn to be more assertive, she didn’t sign up for the student council or soccer. She opted for puppies.

Tung is one of hundreds of girls who have participated in Unleashed, a 12-week program in which middle school girls learn leadership skills by working to find homes for dogs rescued from high-kill shelters around the country.

“It helped me a lot in helping puppies,” says Lola. “It taught me that I have a voice and I can use it.”

Lola’s mother, Pia Tung, 47, a graphics operator who lives in Murray Hill, witnessed her daughter grow more self-assured during the program.

“Lola is less fearful of speaking her mind [now],” says Pia. “She’s more aware of the fact that she can actually make a difference.”

Stacey Radin, a clinical psychologist who specializes in working with women and girls, launched Unleashed in 2011. Late last year, the program was wavering financially and faced closure. Radin turned to the ASPCA for help. Last month, the organization supplied Unleashed with a $12,500 grant. The money will allow the program to continue operating at its current three schools — MS 7, Urban Assembly and the Lab School — and expand to include students at additional schools and foster children from Edwin Gould Services in the fall.

Girls in Unleashed spend Saturday afternoons at the program’s Chelsea animal shelter, enrolling puppies who come in from high-kill shelters around the country. They handle and play with the dogs to assess their personalities, which helps Radin place them with appropriate foster families and, eventually, permanent homes. The middle schoolers also learn about animal issues, such as puppy mills.

“Lola’s adamant about rescuing when people get dogs because she’s been educated about it,” Pia says.

Some of the girls in the Unleashed program go so far as to foster dogs themselves.

That’s what Brooke Kraftson, 12, did when she participated in the program for two semesters last year. She and her family fostered an Akita-labrador mix named Renee.

“We took her in and she was part of the family,” says Brooke, a seventh-grader at the Nightingale-Bamford School. (Unleashed works with both private schools, which pay for the program, and needier public schools, which do not.)

She helped to feed and care for the puppy at home. Brooke’s mother, Ann Kraftson, says taking care of the little dog was a great experience for her daughter.

“This program really built her confidence,” she says. “It helped with being able to speak in front of people . . . and to get more mature.”

After being in Brooke’s care for a week, Renee was adopted by a Hoboken couple.

“I was so sad when she left, but in my heart I knew it was the right thing to give her to these really nice people,” says Brooke.