Wellbeing dog Arlo has one job at Gordon Primary School - to make school a better place.
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The reality is he has many roles, from helping to relieve anxiety and get pupils to class, to being a friendly face and a good listener.
His goal is to create connectedness within the school and school community, and he is being trained in a number of different therapies.
"We don't need behaviour therapy but we do have, like every school, anxiety after COVID. Some students are obviously really worried - it could be from mask-wearing, the disease itself, lots of different things - and Arlo is trained ... to help reduce the heart rate of kids and just make the school a much better place," said Gordon Primary School principal Russel Cowan.
"We've seen a huge turnaround in kids coming in to school. Sometimes we could spend a substantial amount of time in the car park getting kids out of the car in to school, but Arlo does that in about 10 seconds."
So on groodle Arlo's first birthday this week the entire school joined in the celebrations, holding a birthday party in his honour.
"What we have seen by putting this long-term program in place is that the whole school community really gets in together and gets involved."
Arlo received many presents, lots of cards and had birthday party including games and his very own cake.
Arlo came to the school as a wellbeing dog from Dog Connect and is trained by three teachers at the school.
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Unlike traditional therapy dogs that have an owner, he belongs to the school and has three teachers who train him, living primarily with one of them, but if one of those teachers moves to another school Arlo stays and a new teacher can step in as a trainer.
He has Wednesdays off but can come in whenever he is needed.
"Basically we have been trained to introduce a wellbeing dog in to our school setting," Mr Cowan said. "He's the mental health and wellness program for the school. He really is trained to sit here and observe and do what is needed ... he really does help."
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