Volunteering
We welcome volunteers to help with the care of the dogs and the shelter, epsecially those people with special skills. Community Dog Welfare Kopan does not have a structured programme for volunteers, preferring to match volunteers’ skills and interests with our needs at the time.
We are currently looking for longer term volunteers
from 1 - 5 months of full-time work caring for the dogs in the shelter.
Purpose of Volunteering with CDWK
- Provide assistance to Community Dog Welfare Kopan by helping with dog care, construction, publicity, fund-raising, sponsorship, and adoption, as well promotion of dog welfare in the local community, as required at the time.
- Provide the volunteers with experience in caring for community and rescued dogs and interacting with the local community in the Kopan area of Kathmandu.
Schedule, Accommodation & Practical Information:
- The shelter is open to visitors from 9-10am to 5pm and open every day, 7 days a week.
- We don’t have a minimum of hours of work requested per day, volunteers can manage their time as their convenience.
- We do not provide accommodation at the shelter but we can help arrange the stay at a nearby guest house (10 min walk in the beautiful country side) Average cost is 10$ per night.
- For long term stay, we can help arrange an apartment rental nearby, at a lower cost. (Min 1 month, 1-2 persons or small family) Average cost is 6$ per night.
- It’s also possible to stay at Kopan Monastery, according to their rooms availability.
- WE DO NOT CHARGE ANY FEES TO VOLUNTEERS, therefore costs of accommodation are the volunteers responsibility. Thank you for understanding.
- The shelter is located in Paiyutar, Kopan, 15 min walk from the famous Kopan Monastery and 10 min walk from Kharibot Chowk. 2 km from Bouddhanath Stupa in Bouddha. 9 km and 30 min drive from Thamel. 7 km and 25 min drive from Tribhuvan International Airport.
Possible Tasks could include:
- Taking care of our dogs : socialize and communicate with them, including walking, bathing, grooming…
- Medical care and treatment : provide daily care and veterinary treatment for the injured and sick dogs, but also train and teach our staff more skills…
- Dog training : train our dogs that are candidates for re-homing, to increase chances for adoption…
- Creating toys and games for the puppies, spending time playing with them and correcting bad habits.
- Veterinary trips : take the dogs to the vet clinic…
- General maintenance : help our staff with daily cleaning, gardening…
- Building construction : improve the dogs enclosures and do some space changes if needed…
- Painting : refresh the walls indoor and outdoor and paint signs on the gate…
- Organizing : managing and reorganizing the medicine rooms…
We currently need special help for the following :
- Assistance with Social Media : update our Facebook and Instagram and our website with daily posts, photos, small videos, blog articles…
- Filming videos for our new Youtube channel : create content about the daily activities in our shelter from a genuine perspective (ex. film a rescue, followed by the vet trip, followed by the next few days and weeks of recovery…)
- Creating new merchandise : new ideas of handicrafts products related to dogs, we can sell to raise funds…
- Help with designing new flyers, brochures, posters and help us working on prevention and education about animal welfare in Nepal (ex. creating cartoons, games, flyers, books, mural paintings to educate the community…)
- Fundraising : selling our merchandise during markets, distributing flyers in the city, displaying our merchandise, posters and donations boxes in different locations.
- Promoting community vaccinations and sterilization programmes : distributing flyers and posters in the area and interacting with the local community to improve dog welfare.
For volunteering request, kindly email us at contact@communitydogwelfarekopan.org
Past Volunteers
Laurie from France, helping us with social medias and at the shelter! August 2019
Sarah and Mitch with little Alfie (June 2019)
Sonia and Guillem from Spain volunteered with us from December 2017 until April 2018. Each morning they came to take the dogs for lovely walks. They were a great help, particularly with the puppies! They also rescued one puppy off the street and adopted one of the shelter pups.
Trent, from Western Australia, has been visiting the CDWK centre for a few days to a few weeks every month or so since late 2017. The dogs loved his visits because he gave them extra love and took them for long walks, and even jogs. Sad that he has now gone back to Australia - hope to see him here again later in the year!
Connie fell for Kale and Lucky (and vice versa!) and then for Bruce! Connie from Hong Kong also gave us a generous donation - thank you Connie. (May 2018)
Kate, Connie and Pema (May 2018)
Maëlle from Belgium, with Pema in May 2019. Maëlle helped us making the new website and designed our new staff t-shirts. She is helping us with social medias and other things since May 2019.
Maëlle at the shelter August 2019
Kimberley, from Australia, treating Pashi's skin condition with oil (2016). Kimberley helping Doug with fund-raising, sponsorship drive, and website and facebook updates in 2018.
Achille from France spent 3 months with us in late 2017 coming to walk and be with the dogs.
Christiane from Germany spent many months with us in 2016 and 2017, during which time she rescued and adopted Sempa and took him back to Germany.
Rishab and Tom.
Inge walks the pups with Suri keeping an eye on things from behind. (2015)
Gili volunteered for 1 month with us (May 2019)
Gili volunteered for 1 month with us (May 2019)and adopted Tara.
Emilie from France and Tiny, wearing our new T-shirts in June 2019
Marg trying to make friends with Norbu (and succeeding!). Marg also volunteered with us for a few days after a trek. (May 2018)
Lydia from Ireland used to come to the centre each Saturday for over a year to walk dogs, rain, hail or shine. (2013)
Shell helps Kate with treatment of wound on Lucky Kali. (2015)