CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT 1, IAABC 1, KPA 1

This session will discuss the team approach to treating emotional disorders in dogs.

What is the role of a veterinary behaviorist in the successful treatment of emotional disorders in dogs? What is the role of the dog training professional? How should a dog training professional approach a veterinarian about medications?

Veterinary behaviorists and dog training professionals are partners, not adversaries. By working together, we can improve the lives of pets exponentially. Learn how the presenter and her colleagues have learned to work as a team with our dog training partners to build long-term successes.

Learning Objectives:

• Learn about the options for referral of a pet with a behavior disorder.
• Learn how dog training professionals, behavior technicians and veterinary behaviorists can work together to provide the best outcome for the patients that we share.
• Learn how to approach the topic of medical treatment of a behavior disorder. 

About Your Presenter

      

Dr. Lisa Radosta DVM DACVB

Lisa Radosta DVM DACVB graduated from the University of Florida, College of Veterinary Medicine in 2000. During her residency in behavioral medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, she was presented with the American College of Veterinary Behaviorists Resident research award two years in a row.

Dr. Radosta lectures nationally and internationally for veterinarians, their staff and lay people. She has written chapters for a number of textbooks including Handbook of Behavior Problems of the Dog and Cat, Blackwell’s Five Minute Veterinary Consult, Decoding Your Cat and Canine and Feline and Small Animal Pediatrics and is co-author of From Fearful to Fear Free. She has also published scientific research articles in Journal of Applied Animal Behavior Science and The Veterinary Journal and written review articles for Advances in Small Animal Medicine and Surgery, Compendium, NAVC, Veterinary Team Brief, Clinician’s Brief and AAHA Newstat. She is the section editor for Advances in Small Animal Medicine and Surgery and serves on the Fear Free Executive Council and the AAHA Behavior Management Task Force.

She has been interviewed for many publications including Cat Fancy, Dog Fancy, Palm Beach Post, NAVC Clinician’s Brief, Sun Sentinel, WebMD, AAHA trends, Real Simple, Good News for Pets and AAHA News Stat. She has appeared on Lifetime television, Laurie Live, News Channel 25 (West Palm Beach, WPBF), Mitch Wilder's Amazing Pet Discoveries, Nat Geo Wild, Animal Planet, News Channel 10 (Miami, ABC), and Steve Dale's Pet Talk.  She also podcasts for VetGirl.

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT 1, IAABC 1, KPA 1

This session will start by assuming you have some primary research papers saved on your computer or printed out on your desk. Journal articles can look intimidating, and very few make good bedtime reading material. Understanding the scientific form and language is a skill in its own right and improves with practice.

Rather than skimming the abstract, or just reading a summary of the paper on a blog, this session is all about digging into the juicy innards of research articles. Critical appraisal really means working out how much we can trust the results of a study. Did the researchers use the most suitable methods to answer their question? How reliable will those answers be? How useful are the findings in relation to your practice and experiences?

Learning Objectives:

1. Learn the key words and essential sections to look for in an article.

2. Create an outline of the paper using PICOS.

3. Critically read the findings AND decide if it's worth changing your practice.

About Your Presenter    

Dr. Morag K. Heirs PhD MSc MA(Hons)(SocSci) PGCAP CAB

Dr. Morag K. Heirs PhD MSc MA(Hons)(SocSci) PGCAP CAB is a practicing clinical animal behaviorist and an enthusiastic academic with particular interests in research, evidence-based practice, scent work and deaf/blind dogs. She divides her time between academic study and clinical practice.

She is currently a visiting lecturer for the University of Edinburgh (MSc in clinical animal behavior) and supervises MSc research students there. She is also course director for three entirely online MSc programs for practitioners of nutrition science, oriental medicine and complementary medicine, and teaches research skills for practitioners.

She is a director of Well Connected Canine Ltd, based in York, U.K., and manages a small team who provide canine behavior services to private clients, local government organizations, and national animal rescue organizations. She specializes in risk assessment, treating phobias and working with deaf and/or blind dogs. She also includes skills from her previous career as a myofascial release and remedial massage therapist in many consultations.

She also enjoys canicross ultra running with her two collies and a large German wire haired pointer.

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT 1, IAABC 1, KPA 1

Scentwork has taken off across the world as a fun activity to share with your dog, and there are a whole range of methods and approaches. While some methods concentrate on competition, there’s increasing interest in the use of scentwork and nose games within behavior modification programs.

This session will refresh your knowledge of basic scentwork approaches and their effects on the canine brain. Then, using a mixture of case studies and video, it will explore how scentwork can play a key role in behavior modification for a range of commonly presenting problems in dogs, including fear, frustration and more.

Learning Objectives:

• How “sniffing” affects the canine brain.

• What kind of scentwork might we use in a behavior modification program and why.

• How we can integrate scentwork into behavior modification plans.

About Your Presenter    

Dr. Morag K. Heirs PhD MSc MA(Hons)(SocSci) PGCAP CAB

Dr. Morag K. Heirs PhD MSc MA(Hons)(SocSci) PGCAP CAB is a practicing clinical animal behaviorist and an enthusiastic academic with particular interests in research, evidence-based practice, scent work and deaf/blind dogs. She divides her time between academic study and clinical practice.

She is currently a visiting lecturer for the University of Edinburgh (MSc in clinical animal behavior) and supervises MSc research students there. She is also course director for three entirely online MSc programs for practitioners of nutrition science, oriental medicine and complementary medicine, and teaches research skills for practitioners.

She is a director of Well Connected Canine Ltd, based in York, U.K., and manages a small team who provide canine behavior services to private clients, local government organizations, and national animal rescue organizations. She specializes in risk assessment, treating phobias and working with deaf and/or blind dogs. She also includes skills from her previous career as a myofascial release and remedial massage therapist in many consultations.

She also enjoys canicross ultra running with her two collies and a large German wire haired pointer.

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT 1, IAABC 1, KPA 1

How can we help dogs that compete over resources, and the resource is the owner? This presentation will focus on restoring harmony between dogs who have a history of conflicts over their owner’s attention. The presenter will review the setups for safety when working these cases, discuss the behavior change strategies that are most effective, and feature videos of these techniques in action.

He will also highlight how stationing behaviors can be incredibly helpful in these scenarios, as well as discuss when to incorporate operant vs. classical conditioning, and vice versa.

Learning Objectives:

• Learn the safety setups to have in place for these cases.

• Review how stationing behaviors can be used for successful outcomes.

• Understand when we would choose to focus on operant behaviors vs. incorporating classical conditioning strategies.

About Your Presenter    

Michael Shikashio CDBC

Michael Shikashio CDBC is the past president of the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants (IAABC), and provides private consultations working exclusively with dog aggression cases through his business AggressiveDog.com. He is fully certified through the IAABC and is a full member of the Association of Professional Dog Trainers (APDT). He also hosts the popular podcast show, The Bitey End of the Dog.

He is sought after for his expert opinion by numerous media outlets, including the New York Times, New York Post, Baltimore Sun, WebMD, Women’s Health Magazine, Real Simple Magazine, SiriusXM Radio, The Chronicle of the Dog, and Steve Dale’s Pet World.

He is also a featured speaker at conferences, universities, and seminars around the world, and offers a variety of workshops, webinars, and online courses on the topic of canine aggression, including the Aggression in Dogs Master Course.

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT 1, IAABC 1, KPA 1

Through a case series, this session will explore how the partnership between veterinary behaviorist, dog training professional and pet parent improves the lives of the dogs they collectively treat.

Learning Objectives:

• Learn through case-based learning how dog training professionals, behavior technicians and veterinary behaviorists can work together to provide the best outcome for the patients that we share.
• Learn through case-based learning how to approach the topic of medical treatment for a behavior disorder.
• Learn through case-based learning what roles the veterinarian, veterinary technician, veterinary behaviorist, and dog training professional play in the outcome of cases.

About Your Presenter

      

Dr. Lisa Radosta DVM DACVB

Lisa Radosta DVM DACVB graduated from the University of Florida, College of Veterinary Medicine in 2000. During her residency in behavioral medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, she was presented with the American College of Veterinary Behaviorists Resident research award two years in a row.

Dr. Radosta lectures nationally and internationally for veterinarians, their staff and lay people. She has written chapters for a number of textbooks including Handbook of Behavior Problems of the Dog and Cat, Blackwell’s Five Minute Veterinary Consult, Decoding Your Cat and Canine and Feline and Small Animal Pediatrics and is co-author of From Fearful to Fear Free. She has also published scientific research articles in Journal of Applied Animal Behavior Science and The Veterinary Journal and written review articles for Advances in Small Animal Medicine and Surgery, Compendium, NAVC, Veterinary Team Brief, Clinician’s Brief and AAHA Newstat. She is the section editor for Advances in Small Animal Medicine and Surgery and serves on the Fear Free Executive Council and the AAHA Behavior Management Task Force.

She has been interviewed for many publications including Cat Fancy, Dog Fancy, Palm Beach Post, NAVC Clinician’s Brief, Sun Sentinel, WebMD, AAHA trends, Real Simple, Good News for Pets and AAHA News Stat. She has appeared on Lifetime television, Laurie Live, News Channel 25 (West Palm Beach, WPBF), Mitch Wilder's Amazing Pet Discoveries, Nat Geo Wild, Animal Planet, News Channel 10 (Miami, ABC), and Steve Dale's Pet Talk.  She also podcasts for VetGirl.

CEUs: PPAB 1.5, CCPDT (pending), IAABC (pending), KPA (pending)

Consider this; do you know a person that thinks outside the box? Has novel ideas, achievements, sometimes failures, is a problem solver, and demonstrates persistence and resilience? Are these people creative people? Could we as dog trainers assist our dogs in becoming creative in their work, in their problem solving?

The objectives for this webinar will encourage the candidates to think about and address the following:

• How can we avoid frustration in our training?
• How can we empower our dogs to commence problem solving?
• How can we ‘spice up our training’ keeping our students and their dogs wanting more?

About Your Presenter

Dr. Robert Hewings

Author of the award winning ’Scent Training for every dog’ (First Stone Publishers) and head of learning and development for the UK College of Scent Detection, Dr Robert Hewings is a highly experienced Canine Trainer.

Rob retired from London’s Metropolitan Police after 30 years’ exemplary service, 25 of which was as an operational police dog handler. The final nine years as a full-time police instructor with the world-famous Metropolitan Police Dog Training Establishment. He has successfully underpinned his valuable operational experience with the highest academic qualifications, his Doctoral study is entitled ‘Is there a better way? Can humanistic education improve operant conditioning in canine scent detection training?'

During his time at the prestigious Metropolitan Police Dog Training Establishment (2007-2016) Rob headed the training for SWAT dogs, and was active in the instruction and development in all aspects of Police Search Dog Training. He played an active role in the instruction and development of the ‘Canine Training Instructor’ authoring two training manuals, and designing coaching programmes that have enhanced the effective performance of operational dog handlers.

After his retirement in 2016 Rob, took on new challenges to complete his desire to learn, lecturing at university (BSc Canine Behaviour and Training) where he specialised in ‘Assistance Dog Training’, writing his book, and practical assistance dog training using scent-work within epilepsy alert, diabetes alert and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder alert. He also attended Bergin University of Canine Studies where he gained a valuable insight into assistance dog training, particularly for PTSD sufferers.

Rob is now head of learning and development with the UK College of Scent Detection where he has been invited to share his knowledge world-wide, lecturing in USA, Australia and Europe. He is presently engaged in writing two academic papers for enhancing scent detection within the assistance dog community and emotional learning in our dogs.

However, prior to joining the Police Service Rob was a member of the British Army, and as a veteran himself, he has now combined his dog training and academic knowledge becoming a training advisor and consultant for the UK Charity Bravehound (www.Bravehound.co.uk). Here he has pioneered an assistance dog training methodology to incorporate scent alerts for PTSD. Realising the potential of ‘Scent Alert’ for PTSD assistance dogs, where the dog will alert to the onset of a nightmare, or day time anxiety attack. Rob is coaching a Phd student who is writing her thesis supporting and researching Robs hypothesis that dogs can detect these disturbing events, giving our veterans life changing assistance from the dogs.

Finally, Rob truly understands the importance of a positive training schedule with the dogs he trains and the people he coaches. He wishes to share his love and experience of search training with you and your dog. Witnessing the enjoyment, enthusiasm and excitement the dogs get from being engaged in the natural process of ‘nose-work’ has been his guilty pleasure for the last 25 years, long may this continue!!

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT (pending), IAABC (pending), KPA (pending)

Many animal trainers, veterinarians and pet owners highlight the importance of controlling animals. Controlling them, as in restricting the animals’ movement, their choices and their opportunities to control their environment through their behavior.

Sometimes you have to, for safety reasons. But often you don’t – and more often than you might think. Actually, the trend in modern animal training is to deliberately and strategically shift control from the handler to the animal, while still staying safe. Giving control to animals enables us to better understand their quirks and preferences, not to mention reducing fear and improving welfare. In this session, the presenter will walk through a formal training session and discuss all the possible ways of handing control to the animal during training. For instance:

• Does the animal have control when, where and with whom a training session starts?
• When ending it?
• When individual trials within a session start (so called start buttons).
• Which behavior to work on?
• Can he say, “No, actually, I changed my mind?”
• Can he choose his reinforcer?

These questions and more will be discussed. Some might say it’s preposterous to allow the animal to dictate the training session. But that’s not what the presenter is saying you should do. After all, you have options, too, and one of them is to choose when to hand over control to the animal – and when not to.

About Your Presenter

      

Dr. Karolina Westlund

Prof. Karolina Westlund helps pet parents and animal professionals attain happier animals that thrive in the care of humans. She grew up pining for a kitten and pestered her parents until they finally gave in. The resulting black, green-eyed, half-Siamese cat she got for her seventh birthday became a true friend who lived to be 21 years old but was an easily startled cat who often went into hiding when there were visitors. She had grand ideas about becoming a field biologist, but instead she majored in ethology and developed a passionate interest in animal welfare as seen through a multidisciplinary lens, including behaviour analysis and affective neuroscience. She is now an associate professor of ethology at the University of Stockholm, Sweden where she mainly teaches about how behavior management can be used to improve animal welfare. She also conducts live seminars, free online webinars and masterclasses in addition to more extensive courses, as well as the occasional scientific publication on the topic of enrichment, animal training and well-being.

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT 1, IAABC (pending), KPA 1

This session will present an understanding the influence of thyroid disease on canine emotional disorders.

Enjoy an evidenced-based journey through the research on thyroid disease and its effect on canine behavior. Emerge from your journey enlightened and ready to educate your pet parents!

Learning Objectives:

• Understand the current research exploring thyroid disease in dogs as it relates to behavioral signs.
• Understand the potential influence of thyroid disease in dogs on behavior.
• Understand which tests are necessary for evaluation of the thyroid.
• Understand the pros and cons of supplementation.

About Your Presenter

      

Dr. Lisa Radosta DVM DACVB

Lisa Radosta DVM DACVB graduated from the University of Florida, College of Veterinary Medicine in 2000. During her residency in behavioral medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, she was presented with the American College of Veterinary Behaviorists Resident research award two years in a row.

Dr. Radosta lectures nationally and internationally for veterinarians, their staff and lay people. She has written chapters for a number of textbooks including Handbook of Behavior Problems of the Dog and Cat, Blackwell’s Five Minute Veterinary Consult, Decoding Your Cat and Canine and Feline and Small Animal Pediatrics and is co-author of From Fearful to Fear Free. She has also published scientific research articles in Journal of Applied Animal Behavior Science and The Veterinary Journal and written review articles for Advances in Small Animal Medicine and Surgery, Compendium, NAVC, Veterinary Team Brief, Clinician’s Brief and AAHA Newstat. She is the section editor for Advances in Small Animal Medicine and Surgery and serves on the Fear Free Executive Council and the AAHA Behavior Management Task Force.

She has been interviewed for many publications including Cat Fancy, Dog Fancy, Palm Beach Post, NAVC Clinician’s Brief, Sun Sentinel, WebMD, AAHA trends, Real Simple, Good News for Pets and AAHA News Stat. She has appeared on Lifetime television, Laurie Live, News Channel 25 (West Palm Beach, WPBF), Mitch Wilder's Amazing Pet Discoveries, Nat Geo Wild, Animal Planet, News Channel 10 (Miami, ABC), and Steve Dale's Pet Talk.  She also podcasts for VetGirl.

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT (pending), IAABC (pending), KPA (pending)

Given how behaviorists, ethologists, neuroscientists and veterinarians often get into conflict, this talk discusses how our cognitive biases impact knowledge acquisition. Cognitive biases makes us reject information that we should accept, and accept information that we should reject. In this talk, the presenter will discuss a handful of them:

• The curse of knowledge.

• Authority bias.

• The illusory truth effect.

• The availability cascade.

• Tribal epistemology.

• Confirmation bias.

• The Semmelweiss effect.

• The backfire effect.

• Reactance.

• The Dunning-Kruger effect.

The aim of this session is to open attendees’ minds more to how biases come about and how problematic this is – and facilitate those difficult discussions with people who have other backgrounds.

Level of difficulty: Beginner - Intermediate (not difficult concepts but to many people a lot of new terms, maybe)

About Your Presenter

      

Dr. Karolina Westlund

Prof. Karolina Westlund helps pet parents and animal professionals attain happier animals that thrive in the care of humans. She grew up pining for a kitten and pestered her parents until they finally gave in. The resulting black, green-eyed, half-Siamese cat she got for her seventh birthday became a true friend who lived to be 21 years old but was an easily startled cat who often went into hiding when there were visitors. She had grand ideas about becoming a field biologist, but instead she majored in ethology and developed a passionate interest in animal welfare as seen through a multidisciplinary lens, including behaviour analysis and affective neuroscience. She is now an associate professor of ethology at the University of Stockholm, Sweden where she mainly teaches about how behavior management can be used to improve animal welfare. She also conducts live seminars, free online webinars and masterclasses in addition to more extensive courses, as well as the occasional scientific publication on the topic of enrichment, animal training and well-being.

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT (pending), IAABC (pending), KPA (pending)

Classical conditioning is important to understand for anyone interacting with animals. This session will examine and discuss practical examples of:

• The matter of order.
• Blocking.
• Overshadowing.
• Respondent extinction.
• Spontaneous recovery.
• Pre-exposure.
• Learned irrelevance.
• Latent inhibition.

In the session, the presenter will discuss how these learning mechanisms impacts animals’ emotional states, decision making and behavior – and how we can best harness them.

Level of difficulty: Advanced

About Your Presenter

      

Dr. Karolina Westlund

Prof. Karolina Westlund helps pet parents and animal professionals attain happier animals that thrive in the care of humans. She grew up pining for a kitten and pestered her parents until they finally gave in. The resulting black, green-eyed, half-Siamese cat she got for her seventh birthday became a true friend who lived to be 21 years old but was an easily startled cat who often went into hiding when there were visitors. She had grand ideas about becoming a field biologist, but instead she majored in ethology and developed a passionate interest in animal welfare as seen through a multidisciplinary lens, including behaviour analysis and affective neuroscience. She is now an associate professor of ethology at the University of Stockholm, Sweden where she mainly teaches about how behavior management can be used to improve animal welfare. She also conducts live seminars, free online webinars and masterclasses in addition to more extensive courses, as well as the occasional scientific publication on the topic of enrichment, animal training and well-being.

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT (pending), IAABC (pending), KPA (pending)

In this session, the presenter will go over some of the ways she sees good trainers tweak their shaping sessions using completely different strategies depending on context. She will discuss:

• Why the 80% rule is problematic.

• Bold shaping.

• Cautious shaping – pingponging.

• How the 10 Laws of Shaping evolved into the Modern Principles of Shaping.

• Some common shaping mistakes – and how to address them.

Shaping is the sharpest tool in the animal trainer’s box…theoretically. Practically, it can be hard to execute, and many trainers get stuck. Hopefully, this lecture will provide you with some ideas of how to get unstuck.

Level of difficulty: Intermediate

About Your Presenter

      

Dr. Karolina Westlund

Prof. Karolina Westlund helps pet parents and animal professionals attain happier animals that thrive in the care of humans. She grew up pining for a kitten and pestered her parents until they finally gave in. The resulting black, green-eyed, half-Siamese cat she got for her seventh birthday became a true friend who lived to be 21 years old but was an easily startled cat who often went into hiding when there were visitors. She had grand ideas about becoming a field biologist, but instead she majored in ethology and developed a passionate interest in animal welfare as seen through a multidisciplinary lens, including behaviour analysis and affective neuroscience. She is now an associate professor of ethology at the University of Stockholm, Sweden where she mainly teaches about how behavior management can be used to improve animal welfare. She also conducts live seminars, free online webinars and masterclasses in addition to more extensive courses, as well as the occasional scientific publication on the topic of enrichment, animal training and well-being.

Geek Week 2021 - The Sequel

We’re Back and Better than Ever!

Early Bird Rate - Members $200.00. Public $250.00 until August 30, 2021

Join the payment plan and make 4 monthly payments!

Your Presenter Lineup for 2021

Your Session Information

Your Geek Week Schedule

We had so much fun, learned so much and you told us what a great experience Geek Week 2020 was for you that we’ve hit the replay button to bring you Geek Week 2021 in November.  But this won’t be just a repeat of last year.  We asked, you spoke and we heard what you wanted so Geek Week 2021 will include the fantastic upgrades you asked for.

Geek Week 2021 will include all of the most popular features that you loved like:

1. Hosted by 4 collaborating,  aligned industry associations.  We all succeed together!
2. The rare opportunity for you to hear from a fabulous selection of international presenters across many disciplines.
3. At Your convenience and a great  value  - 24-hour sessions to accommodate all time zones
4. Your membership working for you - Discounts for PPG, APDT-Australia, PPG-Australia  and INTOdogs members

It’s worth saying again, could there be a better return on your investment? 

1. Great fun and who doesn’t love SWAG - Fabulous prize opportunities and fun competitions each day
2. No risk and easy access for your continuing education - Recordings available for 6 months after the event
3. So much networking and support of those who support you and our industry - Exhibitors, sponsors and special offers
4. The opportunity for you to drill deeper and solidify concepts and ideas
5. Sponsors Spotlight sessions and panel discussions

And Geek Week, The Sequel will also feature:

1. Convenience and ease of use for you - A brand new platform with enhanced attendee networking, chat functions and live Q&A’s
2. For the uber Nerd in you and in all of us, dig deeper into the science with our new GeeNerd track highlighting the leading edge in academia at its very best.
3. You can never get enough free stuff - so of course you’ll have daily chances for raffle prizes
4. The science is great, but when you use  the science in the real world - Oh what a feeling.  Your Behavior “How To” track, shows you specific, tangible skills across many topics that can be implemented into your own practice.
5. You know the importance of rest so ease into your day before tackling all that science with your 7-day fun warm up with daily raffles and presenter interviews starting November 6, 2021.
6. You get all the access you want with Live Q&A sessions with each presenter
7. Put on your party clothes and join your friends and colleagues at your virtual GeekedUP Fancy Dress Cocktail Party including a selection of great prizes.
8. You love your books so we’ve included a Meet The Author Sessions where you can chat with and question your favorite authors and purchase a signed copy of their featured book.
9. AND finally, in honor of all of our rescue heroes out there Geek Week 2021 will be rescue focused supporting the ongoing education of Shelter and Rescue staff

FINALLY - You don’t want to miss out. Get a head start and be the first to know! Grab your early bird ticket now!

Co-hosted by

If you are a member of a sponsoring organization then please make sure you have the registration code so you can acess the membership rates. 

Early Bird – Before August  30, 2021 Member $200.00 Public $250.00

Post August 30, 2021 Member $250.00 Public $300.00

CEUs: PPAB 1.5, CCPDT (pending), IAABC (pending), KPA (pending)

Scent and the assistance dog sent an assistance dog has truly been a giant step forward it has revolutionised assistance dog training throughout the world. From diabetes alert through to the recently more discovered epileptic alert. I will discuss simple methods that could be used and developed in many aspects of scent-work

The objectives for this webinar will encourage the candidates to think about and address the following:

• How can we introduce this to trained assistance dogs?
• An insight into, an ‘open method’ of training using PTSD Nightmare alert as an example
• Could nose-work be used as ‘release’ for the working assistance dog?

About Your Presenter

Dr. Robert Hewings

Author of the award winning ’Scent Training for every dog’ (First Stone Publishers) and head of learning and development for the UK College of Scent Detection, Dr Robert Hewings is a highly experienced Canine Trainer.

Rob retired from London’s Metropolitan Police after 30 years’ exemplary service, 25 of which was as an operational police dog handler. The final nine years as a full-time police instructor with the world-famous Metropolitan Police Dog Training Establishment. He has successfully underpinned his valuable operational experience with the highest academic qualifications, his Doctoral study is entitled ‘Is there a better way? Can humanistic education improve operant conditioning in canine scent detection training?'

During his time at the prestigious Metropolitan Police Dog Training Establishment (2007-2016) Rob headed the training for SWAT dogs, and was active in the instruction and development in all aspects of Police Search Dog Training. He played an active role in the instruction and development of the ‘Canine Training Instructor’ authoring two training manuals, and designing coaching programmes that have enhanced the effective performance of operational dog handlers.

After his retirement in 2016 Rob, took on new challenges to complete his desire to learn, lecturing at university (BSc Canine Behaviour and Training) where he specialised in ‘Assistance Dog Training’, writing his book, and practical assistance dog training using scent-work within epilepsy alert, diabetes alert and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder alert. He also attended Bergin University of Canine Studies where he gained a valuable insight into assistance dog training, particularly for PTSD sufferers.

Rob is now head of learning and development with the UK College of Scent Detection where he has been invited to share his knowledge world-wide, lecturing in USA, Australia and Europe. He is presently engaged in writing two academic papers for enhancing scent detection within the assistance dog community and emotional learning in our dogs.

However, prior to joining the Police Service Rob was a member of the British Army, and as a veteran himself, he has now combined his dog training and academic knowledge becoming a training advisor and consultant for the UK Charity Bravehound (www.Bravehound.co.uk). Here he has pioneered an assistance dog training methodology to incorporate scent alerts for PTSD. Realising the potential of ‘Scent Alert’ for PTSD assistance dogs, where the dog will alert to the onset of a nightmare, or day time anxiety attack. Rob is coaching a Phd student who is writing her thesis supporting and researching Robs hypothesis that dogs can detect these disturbing events, giving our veterans life changing assistance from the dogs.

Finally, Rob truly understands the importance of a positive training schedule with the dogs he trains and the people he coaches. He wishes to share his love and experience of search training with you and your dog. Witnessing the enjoyment, enthusiasm and excitement the dogs get from being engaged in the natural process of ‘nose-work’ has been his guilty pleasure for the last 25 years, long may this continue!!

CEUs: PPAB 1, CCPDT 1, IAABC 1, KPA 1

Communicating in writing can be tricky, and things can quickly snowball into sticky situations that are stressful and not always good for business.

By the end of this webinar, you’ll have skills and scripts that will allow you to communicate effectively and with confidence. When things get heated and the stress is on, you’ll know exactly how to respond – and help grow your business in the process.

Easily handle uncomfortable issues with a professional, empathic tone:

• How do I get an evasive client to settle his bill?
• How do I establish boundaries with a client who calls or texts me several times a day?
• How do I handle a dissatisfied client who’s demanding a refund they’re not entitled to?
• How can I make my cancellation policy sound firm, but kind?

Business writing is a skill, and communicating electronically in an emotionally-laced industry like ours is a specialized skill. But this webinar will turn the chore into a joy!

No more:

• Stressing over having to deal with a confrontation with a client in writing.
• Feeling guilty about the policies you want to establish for your business.

All this, delivered with large doses of humor!

 

About Your Presenter    

Nancy Tucker

Nancy Tucker is a certified trainer with the CCPDT, and a fully certified behavior consultant with the IAABC. She teaches seminars, webinars, and workshops on dog training, dog behavior, and the business end of training throughout Canada, the U.S., and Europe. She has presented at conferences for the Pet Professional Guild, the IAABC, the Dog Event in France, the WOOF! conference in the UK, and The Lemonade Conference.

She also teaches online courses focusing on various topics, including how to resolve separation anxiety, how to use desensitization and counterconditioning to address fearful behaviors, and how to tackle other common behavior issues.

Nancy has written numerous articles on dog behavior and has a professional background in public relations and copywriting. She shares her home in Québec, Canada with her husband and their border terrier, Bennigan.