Senior project raises money for charity

MOSES LAKE - Pool sharks gathered to shoot a couple games in a good cause Saturday at the Broadway Bar and Grill. The tournament was organized by Moses Lake High School senior Courtney Burkett, to raise money for Pets for Vets.

The tournament was Courtney's senior project. She expected to have a monetary total about midweek, she said.

Burkett said she was following the advice of a judge who graded the 2012 senior presentations. The judge advised students to find something they know about and like to do as the basis for their project, she said. Burkett, as the daughter of an Army veteran, said she wanted to help veterans who had been wounded or injured on active duty.

Her first stop was the Wounded Warrior Project, she said, but at the time she was considering a raffle, which wouldn't have worked for a high school senior. They suggested she look for other possibilities, she said, and after some searching on the net she found Pets for Vets.

Pets for Vets helps animals and veterans. "They take shelter dogs and turn them into companions for veterans," Burkett said. (They take shelter cats, too.) The animals go to military veterans who are coping with physical or psychological troubles connected with their service.

Animals are rehabilitated by professional trainers, according to a brochure from Pets for Vets, and can be trained to be companions to vets in wheel chairs or using crutches. The dogs and cats are trained to fit into the vet's family, the brochure said.

Burkett said the Pets for Vets outreach team answered her questions quickly and gave her brochures and window stickers and cards to hand out and generally just assisted her however they could. "They were so enthusiastic about helping me," she said.

While the pool tournament is her only fundraiser, Burkett said she's continuing to encourage people to donate to the program through the Pets for Vets website, pets-for-vets.com.