Monday June 17th, was one of the best days ever for the five students of our On-site ABC Dog Trainer Classroom Program. Why? All five students graduated the program with honors. To be an honors graduate each student is required to obtain above 90% on all the exams taken during the Classroom Program.
ABC is committed to helping its military students with tuition assistance and funding is available for qualified military families. We are proud to announce that four of the five graduates are Veterans of the U.S. military.
The Dog Trainer Classroom Program has the approval to train veterans and eligible persons under the provisions of title 38, United States Code.
Two of the graduates are pictured below, both were happy to tell us why they chose ABC.
Diana Mogensen
Diana has always loved pets and has been rescuing dogs from the streets of Las Vegas, NV for many years. Diana decided to better her skills to train dogs, so that she could train the strays she was saving.
This is what led her to Animal Behavior College Dog Training Program. Diana has been serving in the United States Army Reserves since she was 19. Now 7 years later she is still currently serving in the U.S. Army Reserves.
Nikole Iudica
Nikole’s Dog Training career began back when she was a small girl. At the age of 10 her parents give her a certificate good for one Puppy of her choice, but the catch was that she had to prove to her parents she was responsible enough to take care of the dog.
Right away Nikole began reading several books about Dog Training, and she prepared a PowerPoint presentation for her parents. Once her parents could see she was serious and ready for the challenge they took her to adopt an Italian Greyhound mix named Tiny.
Nikole worked with Tiny and trained him each day at home, and while going to retrieve the mail from her mailbox up the street. It didn’t take her very long to teach the dog to sit and follow her commands. As she kept walking Tiny, the neighbors began to take notice of how well trained the dog actually was. Soon many of her neighbors asked Nikole to train their dogs.
It was that moment that she knew that Dog Training was something she was good at, and she loved it. As Nikole grew up and moved out on her own she rescued Cooper, a mix of Rottweiler, American Staffordshire, and English Bulldog, from the Castaic Animal Shelter. While training Cooper at the local dog park, people took notice of how well the dog responded to her and the recall training she had done with him.
The dog park visitors would stop and say what a fine job she was doing. After several suggestions by patrons to become a Professional Dog Trainer, Nikole decided to attend a school for dog trainers at Animal Behavior College. Now a graduate of ABC’s On-site Dog Trainer Classroom Program, Nikole has over 13 years experience training dogs and has been rescuing dogs since 2009. Nikole is now the owner of Pawesome Animal Training located in Santa Clarita Valley. She hopes to continue helping dogs and their owners better communicate.
Find out more by watching the event coverage by Studio Santa Clarita.
Animal Behavior College (ABC) is a vocational school that specializes in animal-related career training.
