Our Instructors
All our instructors are committed to using only the most up-to-date, humane techniques to train your dog AND you.
We ensure that you and your dog enjoy learning, whether mastering a sit/stay or learning the latest agility move from Europe.
Marta Coursey
Marta started training professionally in 1998 and has been helping people turn their dogs into family members in the Carroll County area since that time. She competes with her Golden Retriever and Labrador Retriever in agility, Rally, obedience and dock diving.
Professional Certifications:
Certified Professional Dog Trainer
Canine Good Citizen and Community Canine Evaluator
Member of the Association of Professional Dog Trainers
Member Pet Professional Guild
Val Koogle
Val has been training dogs for over 10 years and has competed in obedience and rally. She also has been involved in Doberman rescue for many years and has fostered many dogs so that they can make a successful transition to new homes. Val has worked at My K9 Buddy for 7 years and currently heads the manners department. She strives to make her classes exciting and fun with lots of variety. She shares her home with two Dobermans.
Donna Sims
Donna is a public school teacher who has been involved in agility since 2003. She uses her knowledge as a science teacher to effectively analyze courses and determine the best paths to take with the dog she is running. She has put multiple championship titles on her corgis in both USDAA and AKC and has been a finalist in both USDAA and AKC national events. Donna believes that agility should be fun for both the dog and handler. She feels that it is important to maintain a positive attitude when working with your dog. She has experience both with crazy fast dogs (large and small) and dogs that are less motivated and fearful.
Mary Webb
Mary has been training and showing shelties for over 30 years. To date, her dogs have gotten 10 UDs, 1 UDX, 2 Obedience championships and 2 Master Agility Championships. Utility has always been her favorite class to teach handlers and their dogs. She has helped large and small dogs obtain their UD. She strives to make learning fun for both human and canine and stresses a good foundation and being prepared to compete as the key to success.
Tamara Smith, CNWI
Tamara’s scent work experience began in 2012 with her English Springer Spaniel, Maya. After training in general manners classes, agility, tracking, rally obedience, and barn hunt; Maya decided she liked K9 Nose Work® best and they grew together in their love of the sport. She started competing in NACSW K9 Nose Work® trials in 2013 and achieved the coveted Elite Champion title in Spring of 2020.
Tamara is a NACSW Certified Nose Work Instructor and has been teaching multiple levels of K9 Nose Work classes at My K9 Buddy in Westminster, MD for over five years. She is continually taking virtual classes, seminars, and attending workshops and camps to stay current on the most effective ways to train in the fast-growing sport of scent work. She understands it’s important to learn as much about the person working with the dog as it is the dog and enjoys the relationships she builds with all her students. K9 Nose Work® should be fun on both ends of the leash while building a better bond with your K9 companion while they grow in a recreational sport that encourages them to build on their natural instinct to hunt.
Ruth Sheller
Ruth grew up walking and helping to train her family's border collies as well as training and competing with ponies. Now she loves to train dogs and compete in agility and rally. Her dogs have gained Stunt Dog, Champion, Grand Champion and Performer Trick dog titles with various organizations. She is a Certified Trick Dog Instructor, and AKC Tricks / CGC Evaluator. Ruth is passionate about positive reward based training, and enjoys helping people teach their dogs life skills, confidence, and to have fun training together.
Cher Snyder
Cher has been “owned by” Golden Retrievers for over forty years. She has been an Obedience instructor for fifteen years, teaching Novice, Open and Utility classes. She earned an OTCH and UDX 7 with a very special dog, that competed into the finals of the National Obedience Invitational. She is working toward an OTCH with her current dog. Over the years, she has also titled dogs in Rally, Field, Agility, Tracking, and Conformation.
Cher believes that if Obedience is not fun for your dog, they won’t want to keep doing it. Make Obedience fun and you will both be happy in the competition ring!.
Nick Decesare
Nick has been training Golden Retrievers for over twenty years, earning obedience, agility, field, and tracking titles. Nick was president of the Potomac Valley Golden Retriever Club from 1999 to 2003. Nick has served as agility trial chairman for the Potomac Valley Golden Retriever Club, chairing 38 agility trials since 2000. Nick is currently training his youngest Golden for tracking.
Jan Collins
Jan has spent most of her life starting young horses for the show ring. She has owned Greater Swiss Mountain Dogs for 15 years and her dog, Scopey, was the first Swissy to earn a MACH. She trains her dogs with lots of body awareness skills and use of their hindquarter just as she would start a young horse. She competes with her Swissies in drafting,obedience,rally,agility and conformation.
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Jan Manuel, CNWI
Jan has dogs all her life, but only got into purebred dogs as an adult. She has trained and competed over many years in conformation, finishing championships on her own dogs, as well as, handling other people’s dogs. In performance events, she's trained and competed in obedience, rally, herding, agility (earning at least novice level titles on multiple dogs), and now nosework/scentwork. Nosework/Scentwork has now taken over the dedication that she previously had for conformation. She currently trains and competes in both NACSW and AKC events with her Belgian Sheepdog, Archie.
Diane Lagasse, ANWI
Diane’s scent work experience began in 2019 with her current German Shorthaired Pointers, Holly and Laci.
She began performance dog sports in 2008 with her first GSP in agility and hunt tests. Diane continued with her current dogs in agility but also discovered conformation, K9 Nose Work, fastCAT, CAT.
K9 Nose Work quickly became Holly and Laci’s favorite!
Diane loves watching the different search styles of dogs and can testify that even her own two dogs search very differently. She believes that scent work builds confidence in a dog that is environmentally sensitive. She competes in NACSW (currently NW3 level) and some AKC.
Beth Pickett
Beth is formally expanding into the canine world of training after a lifetime of teaching, training, and competing horses. Although she continues teaching in the horse world, Beth has found a new love in a variety of disciplines with her dogs. She began purposely training her dogs in 2010, then branched into agility classes in 2016. Her desire to better herself and her dogs, along with her love of learning, pushed her into many educational ventures, some leading to achieving industry certifications: Certified Canine Fitness Trainer and Karen Pryor Academy Certified Training Partner. She draws from an eclectic background of teaching experiences to create a positive atmosphere for her students while focusing on the overall health and wellbeing of the animals (as well as their human handlers) in order to reach the goals her students are aiming for. Beth competes in agility with her Australian Shepherds, Carys and Lorecan.
Debbie Maggitti
Debbie has been involved in pet therapy work for over 15 years. She is currently certified and one of the founders of My Caring Paws with her miniature American Shepherd, Lily. She has many years of animal rescue work as a volunteer/fostering dogs/board member/coordinator and has fostered over 85 dogs. She also competes in Nose Work with her dog, Lily.
Rebecca Kirzner
Rebecca is a second generation dog handler. She started showing dogs at a young age and was one of the top junior handlers in the United States. Rebecca has been showing dogs for over 30 years, and professionally for over 15 years. She has shown dogs in multiple countries and has campaigned specialty winners and nationally ranked dogs. Rebecca has taught junior handling and adult handling classes in the local area for many years. She and her husband own Staffordshire Bull Terriers and Border Collies and dabble in other dog sports as well such as agility, herding, rally, and dock diving.
Chris Bevillard, Cpdt-ka acdbc
With over 30 years of dog training experience, Chris emphasizes communication to establish strong partnerships. She has worked with and trained various dog breeds.
CCPDT-KA - Certified Professional Dog Trainer knowledge assessed.
ACDBC - Associate Certified Dog Behavior Consultant with the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants
Member of the Association of Professional Dog Trainers
Member of Pet Professional Guild
AKC - CGC - Canine Good Citizen evaluator
AKC - Tricks evaluator