One of the casualties within our industry during the pandemic has been new dog handler training courses, which thankfully returned in May 2021. Linked to some recent exciting contract wins — but also to what we see as the evolution in the role of a modern-day protection dog team — we’re really excited to announce that we have launched the GSS Protection Dog Scholarship Programme.
As a leading employer of professional dog handlers in the UK, it has been clear that the number of suitably qualified protection dog handlers is not sufficient to meet demand. To help rectify this, we have created this scholarship programme as a supported pathway to bring truly customer-centric individuals, with an obvious passion for dogs, into a career within our industry — an industry that today, more than ever, sees our handler teams front and centre of security operations in areas of high public circulation.
Our inaugural scholarship programme saw us receive over 180 candidate applications in four days. After much consideration, we selected a final six candidates, who attended a protection dog taster day to give them the opportunity to meet some working protection dogs face to face. Thankfully, we had no runners!
The next step for each candidate is to attend a fully funded eight-day NASDU GP Level 2 training course, while we help them through dog sourcing and transitioning to home kennelling. Candidates who successfully pass this course will be offered full-time roles within some of our public-facing central London contract deployments.
This is a hugely rewarding initiative for all involved — not least the clients who will benefit from the introduction of these new team members to their contracts. We will update again on the progress of the candidates’ journeys, and hope to replicate the process later in the summer as we gear up to mobilise numerous new contract wins.