Flying Changes of Virginia, Inc. is a non-profit organization providing equine assisted activities to the New River Valley. We are dedicated to uniting horses and people in order to share in the moments that can help people change direction on the course of life.

Our Mission

Flying Changes of Virginia was formed to promote the physical, emotional and social competence of individuals and their support systems through the delivery of animal assisted therapeutic services. Our goals are to:

• Offer innovative equine services for people with physical and developmental delays
• Support the psychosocial development of at-risk youth through equine assisted activities and education
• Provide training, assistance and advocacy for our clients’ personal support networks
• Utilize the interactions between animals and humans for the training and development of human service professionals
• Facilitate the exploration and development of individuals as they function within groups, teams and corporations

Our History

Flying Changes began years ago in Floyd Virginia—1994 to be exact—as an adjunctive therapy of the Tekoa youth residential facility. It all started with the idea that animals had insight to offer youth who had experienced some of life’s greatest trials and hardships.

Tekoa not only served at-risk youth through residential treatment and care, it also supported innovative and experiential programs designed to meet the needs of the children it helped. After almost 14 years, changes in the ownership of Tekoa made it necessary for Flying Changes to close the program.

You cannot remain unmoved by the gentleness and confirmation of a well-bred and well trained horse; more than a thousand pounds of big-boned, well-muscled animal, slick of coat and sweet of smell, obedient and mannerly, and yet forever a menace with its’ innocent power and ineradicable inclination to seek refuge in flight, and always a burden with its’ need to be fed, wormed and shod, with its liability to laming and heaves, cuts and infections. But when it greets you with a nicker and nuzzles your chest, and regards you with a large and liquid eye, the question of where you want to be and what you want to do has been answered.

~Unknown

Our founding Board of Directors has answered that question and we know what we want to do. Today, Flying Changes of Virginia currently operates at Christiansburg Willow Ridge Farms and continues to provide equine assisted therapy to the New River Valley.