My name is Vincent Snyder and I’ve been on the road for almost six years. I am 14 and I have two younger brothers. I have three cats, Charlie, Stella and Lucy. Volunteering 25 hours per year during highschool is required for graduation. The shelter that I decided to volunteer with was North Beach Paws in Ocean Shores, WA. I chose to work with cats. 

While I was at North Beach Paws volunteering, I helped feed, water and clean the cat litter. I was there in the morning and at night. I helped the people that worked there with unloading and cleaning cats after they were spayed/neutered. I also helped clean cat pens for when a cat was sick or aggressive. 

I chose this shelter because it was only seven minutes up the road from where we were staying at the time. Their form for volunteering was also really easy to fill out. The people that worked at the shelter were really nice and easy to work with. 

My favorite part while I was there was spending time with the cats. This shelter had so many different varieties of cats! For the most part, the cats were nice and calm but some were scared or aggressive. 

While I was volunteering, my old cat Fiona died. I had her for around seven years but she had feline leukemia and developed a tumor that was attached to her heart so we had to put her down, sadly. Charlie was actually available for adoption at that time and was really friendly and greeted me when I walked into the room and was overall just a good cat. We ended up adopting her and so far she’s been a great addition to the family.