Flash Memoir: No kill shelters

In Jtech we work on the animals from the animal shelter. This means we give them their
necessary vaccines to prevent disease and spay and neuter them in other words we make sure
they cannot reproduce. A few weeks back we had a feral queen (female cat that’s pregnant)
come in, she had not been spayed yet hence why she was pregnant. Despite being pregnant,
she was very skinny because she lives on the streets and food is hard to find. My teacher said it
was a miracle that she was still alive while pregnant. She had three kittens and we named them
Jack Jr., Creamie, and Smokey. After she gave birth the mom cat was released back into the
wild because she was feral. The kittens were domesticated (which means they are able to go
into houses and live among humans without being harmful) and they had to get adopted or go
back to the shelter where they possibly could be killed.
One might think that killing the animal would be ok because the shelters get full and if
no one wants to adopt them then what's the point? In Vet tech, we spay and neuter the animals
to make sure they can’t reproduce and make more animals that could be killed. We are helping
the cause by making sure that less animals can be killed. On KSl Matt Gephard said that If zero
killing of any pets, or zero euthanasia of any pets​, is what​ anyone's looking for, it's just not
realistic, which does make sense because it is going to​ happen, that's why we are trying to help
as many animals as we can by fixing their reproductive system. Luckily the kittens were all
adopted and are happy in new homes because we were able to domesticate them. It was a long
process, at first they were really scared to be picked up or touched and would hiss at you. Then
they gradually started to warm up to people until you could finally cuddle with them and play
with them. That's when they were ready for adoption and they were picked up very quickly.
We spay and neuter about 2 animals every Tuesday and Thursday so that's at least 8
animals a week that we are saving and helping out the community. Best Friends mentions “​As
part of our shelter partnerships, we provide Utah animal shelters with the tools and resources
they need to save lives, such as fundraising events and adoption promotions.” They are trying to
help the cause just as much as we are.​ No one wants animals to just roam around on the
streets like the mother cat did when she got pregnant with the kittens so we try our best to make
sure that doesn't happen. I have worked closely with many of these animals and most of them
are so sweet and do not deserve to be killed, I really encourage people to adopt animals
because it is very beneficial. I know that the three kittens that we took care of are doing very
well in their new homes and that wouldn’t have been possible if they went back on the street or
to the shelter to be killed.

Letter of Goals and Choices-

 My goal for my revision was to make it more of a story instead of just simply saying stuff that
answers the question. My writing process for this was bad, I wrote it and then I didn’t really
change it and just turned it in. I love to read the feedback from my peers because sometimes I
don’t even know what to change and some things need explaining. Another one of my goals is
to split it up into different paragraphs because I don’t write in sections and many people have
told me that. The choice I made to meet these goals was to get help in the discussion. I asked
how people split up their ideas and my group responded with how they split up their paragraphs
and thoughts so I tried the same thing and it actually worked really well. I also reread my peer
reviewers notes several times just so I could see what they were saying and change my memoir
accordingly. I had a smart kid in my class read it and he gave me pointers on what I should do
to fix it so I took them because I like taking corrections because I never know what to fix.
Obviously I think it is perfect because I wrote it. I really tried to focus on detail and emotion too
so I added the story about helping the kittens become domesticated and hopefully the reader
can become attached to them and have pathos for the story and maybe they will adopt.

Sources:
https://kutv.com/news/get-gephardt/what-no-kill-really-means-for-homeless-pets-in-utah
https://utah.bestfriends.org/our-programs/shelter-partnerships

Gephardt, M., & Poe, M. (2019, February 20). What 'no-kill' really means for homeless
pets in Utah. Retrieved February 6, 2020, from
https://kutv.com/news/get-gephardt/what-no-kill-really-means-for-homeless-pets-
in-utah

Shelter partnerships. (2019, October 28). Retrieved February 19, 2020, from
https://utah.bestfriends.org/our-programs/shelter-partnerships