Meet Northeast Metro Tech’s New Comfort Dog

WAKEFIELD, MA — Northeast Metro Tech has a new face on campus in the form of an eight-week-old comfort dog.

Superintendent David DiBarri announced the addition on Friday, introducing Nor’E, an English black lab. Nor’E has been on campus since the beginning of the school year.

She is living with Guidance Counselor Jamie Toomey and spends most of her time during the day in the school guidance office with Toomey.

Though she is undergoing a yearlong slate of comfort dog training, Nor’E has made regular tours around the Northeast Metro Tech building and visited with students and staff, DiBarri said.

Nor’E’s main goal on campus is to help comfort students coping with anxiety, according to DiBarri.

“She really is a ray of sunshine and the students and staff alike have been accepting and excited about her, and she’s really elevated moods throughout the building,” DiBarri said in his announcement this week. “After the impact the pandemic has had on students, the need for extra social-emotional support is clear and Nor’E is a big part of our effort to meet those needs.”

Northeast Metro Tech drew on federal Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funding to help obtain and care for Nor’E, as noted in DiBarri’s announcement.

Getting to work at Northeast Metro Tech, Nor’E is at least the second comfort dog now working in Wakefield.

The Wakefield Police Department similarly has its own support dog, who came from the same New Hampshire breeder that has now sent Nor’E to town.

Though based in Wakefield, Northeast Metro Tech draws students from Chelsea, Malden, Melrose, North Reading, Reading, Revere, Saugus, Stoneham, Wakefield, Winchester, Winthrop, and Woburn.