Life

Horses that heal: Western Pa. elementary students engage in equine therapy experience

In light of some hardships within the Belle Vernon Area School District during the school year, groups of elementary students were treated to a unique form of animal-based therapy recently.

Bella Terra Stables of Murrysville provides equine-assisted therapy to groups of all ages and has been partnering with school districts throughout western Pennsylvania to bring their curriculum to schools.

BVA district officials accepted the invitation by Bella Terra Stables and had them get in contact with Amulet Farm Equine Rehab and Conditioning in Rostraver Township to help organize and host the event.

District Assistant Superintendent Alisa King organized a similar program while she was employed in the South Allegheny School District, and she was eager to provide Belle Vernon Area students with the same experience.

"It wasn't new to me, so I was very excited that I could bring the same concept here and find someone that would do something similar," King said. "We went out as adults and thought it was powerful how students could connect to horses, how horses could connect to kids and even adults for that matter.

"If you've watched the news you'll know that Belle Vernon has had some struggles and difficult times this year that a lot of our kids have had to go through for the first time, and that kind of helped us in the selection process today with what classrooms would get to experience this," she said. "I think the good news is that this is not a one-and-done thing. Both of these farms have agreed to continue this relationship, so we're looking forward to promoting more opportunities like this."

Twenty-three students in Jessica Popelas' first-grade class at Marion Elementary school watched as Bella Terra co-owners Amber Power and Ilse Eisele introduced them to three therapy horses, Cei Cei, Della and Little Bit. They explained to the youngsters how they can support themselves and each other emotionally.

As horses exited the field before eventually re-entering, students watched as the horses experienced loneliness. The kids then came up with ways to try and remedy those feelings of loneliness, such as talking to friends and taking a deep breath.

Power and Eisele stressed the importance of compassion with the horses, and every student was invited in to pet the horses and get a picture with them.

As Power put it: "If you can get these horses to calm down, you can calm yourself down, too."

The students beamed with smiles as they got to meet the horses.

"They like to eat grass and they like friends," student Ariana Colon said when asked what she learned about the horses.

When asked which horse was her favorite, Baylee Mathews answered, "all of them."

The duo with Bella Terra was ecstatic talking about the facilities at Amulet Farms as well as student participation.

"Amulet was amazing," Power said. "They were the ones that brought us in and supported us the whole way. Their facility and mission to rehabilitate horses is just amazing. Coming in to see these kids today knowing that they've had some hard things happen was amazing to teach them some life skills about moving forward and finding strength within themselves to move on."

"Seeing these kids come off the bus with smiles and leaving with even bigger smiles, learning about themselves and petting different horses, was great," Eisele said.

Power and Eisele explained that the horses at Bella Terra come from situations involving neglect or abuse. Cei Cei suffered some abuse in her life and provides help to children dealing with similar feelings, Della serves as a grief counselor for kids and Little Bit provides assistance to students experiencing neglect.

For some students, these feelings might be relatable, and they're hoping that the horses not only provided relief to those feelings, but also ways to effectively deal with them.

"What we saw today was learning about hard things and learning some resources about moving forward when things get hard," Power said, as Eisele continued, "learning self confidence, learning boundary setting, friendship building, anything that comes up in life."

Janet Collins, owner/manager of Amulet Farms, said she also enjoyed the experience. She brought the horses from Murrysville to her facility so that the BVA students could enjoy them close to home. Tom Svrcek is also an Amulet Farms owner.

"I'm blown away," Collins said. "We work with horses daily, but I've never seen it in this capacity with how the kids responded, how the families responded, how the adults responded. I think we all learned something."

She made sure to share her appreciation to the school board for making the event happen.

"Their hearts are golden," Collins said. "For everything that they did to set this up for these children going through a really hard time in their life, my hats go off to them. Everyone has something to offer, and it was a wonderful event."