Saline County Sheriff’s Office (SCSO) Corporal Logan Knight and Arkansas State Police (ASP) Corporal Quinn Best visited the 3rd grade class at Harmony Grove Elementary School Tuesday morning. Although both officers are good looking and extremely bright, it was K-9 “Alf” who stole the show.
Principal Donaldson had notified the SCSO that 3rd grade students recently completed a chapter in Social Studies focusing on police and the use of police K-9 dogs. Corporal Knight and Corporal Best showed about 75 students how K-9 units can search for missing people, sniff out narcotics and be trained to bite and release.
Corporal Knight brought his Golden Retriever, Alf. The dog is a dual-purpose K-9, trained in tracking and narcotics detection. Alf is passive and very friendly. The 3rd grade students got a chance to watch Alf work in detecting narcotics. They were told by Corporal Knight and Corporal Best that police K-9 dogs are rewarded by praise and are often rewarded with a play-toy. When Alf completes a successful drug sniff, he gets rewarded by his handler, Corporal Knight, who tosses him a tennis ball.
Corporal Knight hid a small bag of marijuana inside a podium on the stage then demonstrated how Alf uses his nose to detect the smell of the drug. Once Alf alerted twice, Corporal Knight tossed the tennis to him and praised him.
At the end of the presentation, students were able to pet Alf ask Corporal Knight as many questions as they wished. ASP Corporal Best also presented each student with a gift certificate for a free ice cream.