I believe any of them would be a wonderful service for you. A guide dog is an incredible best friend to have, one who can help keep you safe. But you do realize that a lot of the 'work' is actually done by the blind person, right? A lot of people who have no visual impairments, and know no blind people, believe the guide dog itself does all of the work. Nope. You have to give them commands and instructions. They are not mind readers. But they can let you know when there is an obstacle, or danger, in your way. Good luck!

I just got my first guide dog last October. I went to Leaderdogs for the Blind in Rochester Hills, Michigan. They also have a warm weather school in Florida. I had done my O&M at the Michigan school when I first went blind 2 years ago. They flay you to the school, providing transportation and room & board et al for free. There is an option of doing part of the training in Chicago as well. Further, they also provide an in-home option tha5 one of my friends did.

I would recommend looking at success rates for clients, that is, the percentage of clients who successfully handle their guide dog after training. When I chose LD, that was one of my criteria.

In addition, I read anecdotal stories about the level of “institutionalization” the school had. For example, are you “allowed” to leave campus? Can you have alcohol? What is your level of independance at the school? At LD we could leave campus (say of family visited), but not take our new doggo. We could have alcohol in our rooms. We had to check in or out o& the campus, even if just walking outside within the fenced area. I didn’t f8nd this burdensome.

Good luck, and if yo7 have more questions, HMU.

My father had a dog from Guiding Eyes for the Blind in NY 30 years ago, and that’s where my son will get his

I just went through the process of researching schools and getting my first dog and I went with Guid dogs for the blind

They are 100% free they fly you out. there and the program is only two weeks so it doesn’t effect your life much. The trainer student ratio is one trainer to two students so you really aren’t waiting that long.

There’s so much I can tell you about my experience if you have specific questions feel free to pm me I did a lot of research on the subject

Seeing Eye would be the one that I'd personally go to for my first guide, only because I like their training style.

I've gotten all three of my dogs from Seeing Eye in New Jersey. Other good ones are Guide Dog Foundation in New York, and Guide Dogs for the Blind in California and Oregon. All of these schools will fly you out there to train with your dog. Leader Dogs is okay from what I've heard but not great. Avoid Pilot Dogs; all I've heard out of that school are horror stories.

City, state, country?

Every person‘s experience will be different. That being said I did choose seeing eye for my first dogs. However, both of them had to be retired within the first 10 months. I am now going to be applying for guiding eyes because I feel like they have very good success rates as well as a longer class time. I think a longer class time is much better. Especially if this is going to be your first dog. Two weeks just doesn’t feel like enough to learn what you need to learn even with the crazy schedule most schools keep. My advice is to not be scared to call each school and ask them questions. Find graduates from each program and see how they are… A lot can be told by how the graduates of a certain school comport them selves or treat their dogs. Narrow it down and realize there is nothing wrong with applying to more than one school at a time. Never be scared to ask the question “why”and be careful not to fall into dogmatic following of a particular school or method.
I wish you the best of luck! Having a dog it is really an amazing experience

Pilot also as a O and M program for basic cane travel

as far as a school with not a load of and documentation requirements is Pilot dogs. Please don’t believe the horror stories stuff so and so heard about pilot dogs. If a person has never been there they should not spread rumors. Pilot’s training is a little old fashion , using the award and correction training like most schools.

they do not used planned traffic checks like say my school southeastern guide dogs did. a planned traffic check is where a school trainer simulates traffic situations with a school vehicle.

for example:
the team is walking towards a driveway leaving a Business and a driver cuts off the team as their about to step into the drive way and cross.

a team is about to cross a driveway and a driver sppeeds through the driveway without stopping.
a team is about to cross a driveway and the vehicle is idling and not moving, handler talks to driver to ask if their going to move, handler then walks in front of or behind to get pass the vehicle.

at Pilot they use natural traffic checks with the normal flow of traffic.

for example
my husband was in training when he was about to cross a street that had a off ram from a highway . he is about to cross when he had the green light and a parallel traffic pattern . just about when he steps into the street a 18 wheeler speeds from the offram and speeds through the intersection . His fdog stops in and his tracks , body blocks and turns him around , back to the curb .

body blocking is where a dog crosses in front of the handler stoping forward movement

some schools don’t encourage the behavior.

I hoped this helped.

note:
Pilot dogs is certified by the International guide dog federation , like the bigger schools like THe Seeing eye, Guide DOg foundation , GUide Dogs for the blind, GUide dogs of AMerica, GUide dogs of the desert , Southeastern GUide dogs , Fidelco Guide dog Foundation . , Freedom and GUiding Eyes. GUide dogs.

the smaller schools are
Freedom GUide DOgs,

GUide dogs of Texas
Occupaws guide dog Association
working my second dog from Southeastern a yellow lab. want a Shepard as my next.