The Peoria students will be assigned a puppy to live with. They will bring the dogs to school and work with them as part of their training and care.

The class is open only to juniors, and students who sign up must also go through an interview process.

Andrea Ramirez, 16, signed up. She said it will be hard raising and training a puppy every day but that it is worth it because of the greater purpose it serves.

"Knowing that someone will benefit from all the work I do and the experience that I will get is a good reason to sign up," she said.

The four-credit pilot program is a school partnership with the foundation, a nonprofit organization that assists disabled and impaired individuals who have or need a service dog.

When it begins, Gail Meserve, the lead instructor, will teach students how to train dogs to perform various tasks including opening doors and picking up objects for their owners along with dog safety and care.

Through grants and donations, the fully trained service dogs coming out of the program will cost $5,000 instead of $20,000 through a service-dog agency, Meserve said.

C.J. Betancourt, the foundation's director, said the partnership is a wonderful idea.

"This has never been done before, and I hope to bring it to other high schools in the state," she said.

Jan Delgado, internship coordinator for Peoria High, said the first recipient of a student-trained service dog will be Bill Weigt, a Peoria police officer who was shot in the chest in 2005.

Weigt is disabled from the chest down.

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Information from: The Arizona Republic, http://www.azcentral.com