Officer Sage reporting for duty

When Sage arrived at Utah State University, she was 10 weeks old and weighed 13 pounds. She is now seven months old and weighs around 50 pounds.

Sage, a labrador retriever, has been working as a Critical Incident and Crisis Response K-9 for the university’s police department since shortly after she arrived at Utah State on Oct. 29. She spends her days at work with her handler Lt. Shane Nebeker, and she lives with him and his family.

As Sage has grown up over the past few months, she has been going through different training sessions to help her do her job more effectively both in large groups and in one-on-one situations. Sage recently went away to an intensive training for two weeks.

“You know, I can’t tell her that certain things are not acceptable and certain things are,” Nebeker said. “But she’s responded very, very well to training as a whole, so she’s progressing really, really fast.”

Police chief Jason Brei had the idea to bring a dog in Sage’s role to the department and the university as a whole. Brei said since bringing Sage to Utah State, they have received very positive feedback about her from employees, students and the community outside of the university.

Brei said the department has received requests from different groups around the university to have Sage at different events and functions. Some of those requests come with a specific purpose for Sage to serve, but other times, people just want to have her around in general.

Sometimes Sage is requested when there are heavy discussions about hard topics or traumatic events and experiences. This is the critical incident part of her role.

“She’s been brought in to be part of those, and very well received,” Brei said. “She was able to deal with that climate and that different interaction very well.”

One situation where Sage was utilized was at the memorial for a highway patrolman who lost their life on duty. Brei said she handled the emotion of that experience well, and she was able to be a supportive and calming presence.

Sage has also been taken to more light-hearted university events such as Casino Night in February.

Nebeker said Sage has been great at working in large group situations, but now they are starting to focus on training her for more one-on-one situations.

“This is so that when we start to use her in crisis situations or in therapy interview situations that she’s focused on the individual and not on the reward — that her reward is actually that interaction,” Nebeker said.

Because Sage is still a puppy, Nebeker said she still gets distracted easily. They are working to take away some of those distractions and teach her to focus on the person or people she is working with.

One thing Sage has been working on in her training is being able to calmly offer affection to people.

“Getting to the point where she can read the emotions that are going on inside the room and sense who really needs it,” Brei said. “Dogs in these situations can be in a room and with whatever senses that they are keying off of, can find out who’s really in a very dark place and be able to go sit by them and offer them the affection without running and jumping on them.”

Nebeker said Sage gets to be a carefree puppy at home, and she runs around with his other dog. He said her demeanor changes when they get in the car to go to work — she gets a little more serious.

“I think she’s figuring out that this is a job,” Nebeker said. “It’s been fun to watch her do that.”

As the department goes forward with Sage’s training, they are working on getting her a few certifications. First will be her Canine Good Citizen certification, which is usually received around a year old. They also want her to receive a first responder therapy certification.

Sage has grown since arriving in Logan, and Brei said she is now more like a “teenage dog” than a puppy. Nebeker said physically she has grown, but her social, happy attitude has not changed.

Nebeker said coming into the project of training Sage, he didn’t have a lot of expectations because the idea of this type of K-9 is so new.

“I really wanted her to have a positive influence,” Nebeker said. “And she has. If that’s the expectation, she’s far exceeding that.”