How one man and his dogs are helping rural kids stay off the streets and realise their dreams
Bernie Shakeshaft, 2020 Local Hero in the Australian of the Year Awards credits dogs with the success of his programs helping troubled kids live a better life. Find out more about the potential of dogs and the best dog-friendly activities near you.
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Imagine a world without dogs.
It is an inconceivable concept for BackTrack Youth Works founder Bernie Shakeshaft, who credits these loyal and loving creatures with the overwhelming success of his programs.
Named the 2020 Local Hero in the Australian of the Year Awards last month, Shakeshaft has helped more than 1000 of the country’s most vulnerable young people get off the streets and stay out of jail while realising their hopes and dreams.
Focusing on at-risk teens, the programs help participants address their emotional and educational issues while tackling reasons preventing them from progressing in life – such as housing, financial, social and legal issues.
So moving and inspiring are some of these stories, Australian filmmaker Catherine Scott created the documentary Backtrack Boys to much acclaim in 2018.
And last year in July, Hachette published Shakeshaft’s autobiography Back on Track – co-written by James Knight – highlighting the potential one person has to make an impact on society.
Since its humble beginnings in 2006 from a shed on the outskirts of Armidale in NSW, non-profit Backtrack has trusted in the healing powers of specially bred showjumping cattle dogs to transform lives.
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More recently, kelpies and Great Danes have been introduced to the programs.
“We use [dogs] across all areas of our business now,” Mr Shakeshaft said.
“Originally we started off just training a handful of pups and then it was about trying to find an activity to get kids out of town at times of high risk on Friday and Saturday nights.
“So we started competing in a working dog high jump event. We’ve been doing that since 2006 and it’s just kept growing and growing.
“We now have a girls program, take [the dogs] to visit nursing homes and have an early intervention program where we take them to schools to visit kids, where a kid comes and reads with the dog for half an hour.”
Mr Shakeshaft said the benefits of encouraging children to read to a dog should not be underestimated.
“The dog doesn’t judge them, knows nothing about their history or whether they’ve been in trouble with the cops or whether they can read or write. There’s just no judgment,” he said.
“That’s why it works so well. In the primary schools where the kids read to a dog, the dog never points out that the book is upside down or you don’t pronounce that like this.”
Not only do dogs help children feel connection to another living creature, their demeanour helps instil important life skills.
“Kids learn how to do things in nonviolent ways, how to get someone to work alongside you without using stand-over tactics,” Shakeshaft said.
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“You hear lots of lovely stuff about kids saying you can tell a dog anything and they won’t tell anyone.”
Such is their giving nature, dogs can experience burnout, so it is important for Shakeshaft and his team to ensure their four-legged workforce receives adequate downtime.
“We have to rotate the dogs [because] it wears them out a fair bit, all the emotional stuff,” he said.
“You just see the dogs get flatter and flatter. I can’t quite put my finger on it. Somehow they take that negative energy out of people.
“They just soak it up. It’s kind of when people see them they just let it all go and the dog sort of soaks it up.
“We know which dogs are good at dealing with more than others but they’re on a constant rotating sort of roster.
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“So we just take them out of the mainstream and leave them be for a bit then you work on the things the dogs love doing.”
Just as with people, each dog has its own unique personality and will tend to gravitate toward those it best relates to.
“Some dogs are healers, they’re quieter dogs, happy, just stop sit with someone who’s really toughing it out,” Mr Shakeshaft said.
“ADHD kids who are bouncing around, it’ll be bouncing around dog that hangs with him. So they seem to be able to switch to different kids all the time, I mean certainly some kids get attached to a certain dog but they rotate through the kids depending on what’s going on.”
The dogs of Shakeshaft’s life have taught him patience and “not to worry much about tomorrow” and to “just be here in the moment” but it’s how they have helped him change lives that’s made the biggest impact.
“I thought we were just going to be goofing around with a couple of kids in a tin shed,” Shakeshaft said. “But to see them out with jobs and not in trouble with the cops, still alive and not in jail, is everything.
“They’re absolutely happy. Starting their own families. We’re constantly getting feedback that ‘you saved my life, thank god someone was there’.”
Originally published as How one man and his dogs are helping rural kids stay off the streets and realise their dreams
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