How To Become A Shelter Director: What It Is and Career Path

What is a shelter director and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

2 min read

There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a shelter director. For example, did you know that they make an average of $21.59 an hour? That's $44,902 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 12% and produce 20,400 job opportunities across the U.S.

ScoreShelter DirectorUS Average

Salary

3.5

Avg. Salary $44,902

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

9.7

Growth rate 12%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

5.5

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.89%

Asian 5.20%

Black or African American 11.85%

Hispanic or Latino 14.64%

Unknown 5.40%

White 62.02%

Gender

female 71.14%

male 28.86%

Age - 45

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 45

Stress level

9.7

Stress level is very high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

8.8

Complexity level is advanced

7 - challenging

Work life balance

5.0

Work life balance is fair

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a shelter director

Explore shelter director education requirements

Most common shelter director degrees

Bachelor's

55.5 %

Master's

25.4 %

Associate

14.4 %

Start to develop specific shelter director skills

Skills	Percentages
Social Work	24.30%
Direct Supervision	8.72%
Client Intake	8.15%
Emergency Shelter	7.39%
Social Services	6.20%

Complete relevant shelter director training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 6-12 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New shelter directors learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a shelter director based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real shelter director resumes.

Research shelter director duties and responsibilities

Manage pet adoption programs and supervise animal intake, disposition and euthanasia activities.
Coordinate services for JSU, DHS, schools and community.
Chart audit to ensure that documentation meets DHS and OTDA standards.
Direct the administrative and clinical operations of rehabilitation services for a two-campus 325-bed acute-care hospital and hospital-base home health agency.

Get shelter director experience

Generally, it takes 4-6 years to become a shelter director. The most common roles before becoming a shelter director include case manager, program director team lead and counselor.

Prepare your shelter director resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your shelter director resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a shelter director resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable shelter director resume templates

Build a professional shelter director resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your shelter director resume.