Equine Education Connection: Learn More About Equine Education Connection
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Equine Education Connection
The goal of the Equine Education Connection - Equine Therapy Center is:
- To help educate horse owners of the many different equine therapies available to help enable horses to have a better quality of life and to reach their full potential.
- To provide quality information and instruction to enable horse owners to apply equine therapy to their own horse in a safe and effective way.
- To provide information to help people considering an equine massage therapy school so that they can make a more informed decision about which school to choose.
- To share some thoughts about equine massage therapy on-line and correspondence schools claiming you can use their program to start your own equine massage therapy business.
I believe that knowledge is power. The more you know, the better equipped you are to make better, more informed decisions. I hope that you come away from Equine Education Connection feeling that you learned something about horses you didn't know before. If this website helps even one horse have a better life, then all my hard work was worth it.
Why is all of this information and instruction FREE?
After years of watching equine therapy change horse's (and their owner's) lives for the better, I really want to make this information available to everyone who is interested to help as many horses as possible. Not only will I provide quality information and instruction, I am
willing to share the "tricks of the trade" that I have learned along
the way.
I am really hoping that making this information available on the internet might help horses to have a better quality of life. And, possibly even help them to stay in their current homes. I have come across many horses that were about to be sold or sent to harsh trainers until I worked with them. The owners were either thinking the horses could no longer do their job, or they were getting tired of dealing with equine behavioral problems (which actually ended up being physical problems.)
The only thing that costs anything is if you wish to watch the videos. But even then it will cost less than half the price of 1 (one) good equine therapy book.
Another reason for offering this information is that over the past few years, I have noticed a rise in the amount of at home correspondence schools available to "teach you to start your own business" in equine massage. I am appalled by the high costs that some of these "schools" are willing to charge for the information that they are offering (I have seen as high as almost $2000). And that, after never even seeing the person work on a horse in person, are willing to give them a "certification" to work on other people's horses.
I have a friend who used to say that, "You can't complain unless you are willing to do something about it." So, I am offering this website as a FREE online correspondence course - so to speak - for those of you who just want to learn equine therapy for your own benefit.
If you are only wishing to learn equine therapy to help your own horse, you can learn that from the comfort of your own home. But, there are other more cost effective ways to do this besides paying a high price to either an on-line or correspondence school. A few suggestions would be:
- Use this website - it is full of quality information and instruction including hours of videos showing equine therapy in action.
- Purchase good equine therapy books and videos on the subjects that you are most interested in.
- Go to equine seminars about the different therapies that you have an interest in where you can learn equine therapy hands-on with the supervision of a qualified professional.
- Take a hands on class at a local massage school. (A lot of massage schools will have a 1 or 2 day introductory class) Even though you will be learning on a person, you will be able to apply what you have learned to your horse. I think practicing on a person is a very good way to learn - people are able to give you verbal feedback.
For those of you who want to learn equine therapy for a career - I have
to say that I honestly do not believe that you will be able to learn
enough from a correspondence school to start a business in equine
therapy. If you truly want to have a career in equine therapy, you owe
it to yourself and your clients to acquire training from a qualifiied
professional in a hands-on class setting.
I have personally been taken by a correspondence course.......oops, I mean, I have personally taken a correspondence course. I spent around $2500 to find out that they weren't teaching me as much as I could learn from books and videos that I found on the subject. (dog training) I came away very disappointed and feeling taken advantage of ......and $2500 poorer. If I could do this over, I would have learned as much as I could from good books and videos and then paid a good dog trainer to allow me to be an apprentice with them. (I am actually going to do this in April)
If you are thinking of going to an equine massage therapy school, I hope that you find the information and instruction on this website to be a good introduction. By reading the information and watching the videos, you can learn more about equine massage therapy. Since you will then know more about equine therapy, you will be able to make a more informed decision about what you are looking for in an equine massage therapy school. I hope that you will look for a school that will really teach you how to be a qualified and competent equine therapist.
Note:
Some equine sports massage schools are only 50 hours long and provide only basic information about equine massage. I honestly do not think you are going to be able to learn enough about equine massage in 50 hours to be a qualified equine therapist. If this is so possible, why is it that you must have at least 500 hours of classroom training to be a certified human massage therapist?
I actually think working on horses is harder than working on a person. And not just because they are bigger. People are able to verbalize what is bothering them. With horses, we need to be able to figure out what is going on by understanding the equine structure, knowing how to properly palpate, examining the gait abnormalities, etc, etc. There is no way to teach all of this in 50 hours. Most likely, they will teach you the basics and a sequence.
I have actually talked to some people who have gone to what is considered one of the best equine sports massage therapy schools in the United States. This school is one that teaches the whole course in 50 hours. All of these people have told me that they came out of the school feeling unqualified to work with other people's horses for a business. One person even told me she wishes she could have her money back so that she could have gone to a different school.
So, please, if you wish to be a well educated, effective equine therapist, consider going to one of the schools that will provide a more thorough curriculum. If you think it will cost less to go to the shorter school, keep in mind that you are probably going to have to pay for continuing education anyway.
With all that said, I hope you are ready to learn about equine massage and other alternative equine therapies. I know that you will see a change in your horse. A change in the relationship between you and your horse. And, hopefully, you will start to understand more about what your horse is trying to tell you through his body language and behavior.
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