Wendy van Kerkhove

Wendy van Kerkhove

Wendy van Kerkhove grew up in NJ and currently lives in Minneapolis .  She holds an undergraduate degree in Economics (extremely useless for dog training) and dreams of getting a Ph.D. in Psychology one day.

In 1999 Wendy quit her day job and attended the very first Academy of Dog Trainers at the San Francisco SPCA in the fall of 1999. She credits Jean Donaldson with delivering a six week program so intense and vigorous that it could make anyone break out in hives.  Upon completion, Wendy accepted a position as an Area Pet Trainer for PETsMART. As part of her training, she was sent to St. Hubert ‘s Dog Training School in NJ and was held hostage by the PETsMART development team for four weeks. During this time Pam Reid, Pia Silvani and Mary Lee Nitschke managed to cram even more excellent information into her head!

Currently Wendy is the owner of Fresh Air Training which specializes in Bark, Snark & Growl classes and conducting private training sessions for those humans with dogs who are reactive to other dogs. She is a frequent contributor to the Chronicle of the Dog, TC Dog and will be published in JAAWS (Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Sciences) in 2005.

Wendy is a self described Learning Theory junkie. She shares her home with Algebra the Cockapoo, Geometry the Border Collie mix, Hewlett, Kermit, Minerva and Quidditch the cats, Hedwig, Bert and Annie the parrots and her partner, Tina. All have been operantly conditioned, but none of them know it!