Ten-year-old former West Central Alberta schoolgirl Shayla Spargo-Pearce likes the free roaming horses west of Sundre so much that she wanted to share her passion with her fellow students at the Whitecourt Central School.
To do that, she recently handed out more than 400 pre-printed postcards to grades 3-5 students calling for future capture programs for the horses to be stopped.
The postcards came from the Cochrane-based Free Spirit Sanctuary organization, which is running a “Protect Alberta's Wildies” campaign.
The cards read: “We the children and youth of Canada ask you to stop the capture of Alberta's Wild Horses and protect them so they can remain wild and free forever.”
The postcards are addressed to Robin Campbell, Alberta minister of Environment and Sustainable Resource Development.
Shayla explained that she got the idea of getting her fellow students involved after her grandfather visited Sundre.
“Papa came home from Sundre where his artist friend had given him a postcard for me to sign,” said Shayla. “We started making a list of the pros and cons. I wanted to get more postcards signed so I asked the teacher if I could bring them into the classroom.
“Mrs. Skipper, my team for success coach, thought maybe I could do the whole school. Mom and me went on Facebook and ordered 450 postcards. I only have 11 left.”
Stopping future horse captures is the end goal of her campaign, she said.
“It's not fair for the wild horses to be caught and slaughtered,” she said. “The horses can't stand up for themselves. It's not right to make the decision on which ones live or die.”
While she was a little nervous presenting the cards to her classmates and speaking a little about the horses at the same time, it was all worthwhile, she said.
“At first I was really scared and I held my report in front of my face. After a few classrooms I wasn't scared any more,” she said.
Shayla's mother Shandel commended her daughter for her passion.
“My daughter is a very soft soul,” said Shandel. “She has love for any and all animals. She started really getting into horses last summer. Her papa sold her first horse this year. This project has been great for my daughter. It has helped her with her self-esteem.
“We had a home fire April 8 and even through that she didn't lose sight of her goal. The next week she continued on with her presentation. We are very proud of her.”
