The UCA Pre-Vet club held a service themed event called “Kitten Kisses” right before Valentine’s Day. 

On Feb. 12 during x-period, members of the club gathered with other interested students.

“Kitten Kisses is an event where we take donated t-shirts and we turn them into cat toys to donate to shelters,” Emma Billard, co-president for the pre-vet club, said. 

To make the toys, the first step for participants was to cut the shirts into strips.

“From those strips, we’ll take an inch wide and then three to four inches long, you stack the strips and then you just tie them into a knot,” Bullard said.

Some joined as members of the club, and others came from seeing it online and hearing about it from biology courses. 

“I was scrolling through GivePulse because I need community service, and I want to do community service. And I think I first heard about it in Miss McDonald’s class because I had her for biology,” Cheryl Kurtz said. 

Bullard said that some participants are animal lovers and some are aspiring veterinarians. 

“Being able to be hands-on as much as we can during our school time is really important for us,” Bullard said. 

“I’ve been taking care of cats my whole life. And I love cats and kittens so much. And this is just such a great cause because, you know, all those poor babies that don’t have homes need toys,” Kurtz said.

Bullard said the event’s goal was to have as many cat toys as possible made to donate as quickly as possible as they wanted shelters to be able to use them very soon. 

“As soon as we have enough to donate, we’ll go ahead and donate them. A lot of shelters don’t have a lot of profit coming in,” Bullard said. “Toys, you know that’s not the main priority. Their priority is having a safe place for these animals to live and keeping them fed. So by donating these toys, that’s an expense that shelters don’t have to think about.”

Kurtz said that having the cat toys for the kittens in the shelter gives them something to do and it boosts their morale. 

“It also keeps the kittens engaged and it just helps to lift their spirits a little bit,” Bullard said. 

Bullard said she believes the service opportunity is not only good for the community, but also allows the club to get together for an activity. 

“It’s important because we want to build a community within the club. We don’t want it to be something that you just come up and you sit in this meeting and then you walk away with a little bit of knowledge.” Bullard said. “We really want to be here for each other and then be able to help support our community.”

The pre-vet club has had other events that benefited shelters. 

Bullard said that they previously did a dog toy drive so now they turned their attention to cats.