Dr. Chris Pachel is a board-certified veterinary behaviorist and is the owner and lead clinician at the Animal Behavior Clinic in Portland, Oregon. Dr. Pachel lectures extensively worldwide, teaches courses at multiple veterinary schools in the United States, and has authored numerous articles and book chapters for veterinarians and pet owners. He is a sought-after expert witness for legal cases and serves on the Editorial Advisory Board for dvm360. He is also a Vice-president of Veterinary Behavior for Instinct Dog Behavior and Training, as well as co-owner of Instinct Portland, which opened in the fall of 2020.

Leah Craig Chumbley has worked in the nonprofit sector since 2009, driven by a desire to decrease suffering and increase joy in the world. She is currently the Executive Director of Brother Wolf Animal Rescue in Asheville, North Carolina, where she is honored to work to better the lives of companion animals and the people who love them.

Kristen Brown joined the Lynchburg Humane Society in 2021. She graduated with a Master of Nonprofit Management from Liberty University in 2023 and is a Victoria Stilwell Academy Certified Dog Trainer. As the Pet Help & Behavior Manager of the Lynchburg Humane Society, Kristen manages the intake of all pets, evaluates dogs, develops and implements behavior plans, designs playgroups and enrichment schedules, runs multiple public training classes, and more. Kristen is also involved in special projects such as Pathway Planning and creating a system for volunteer dog walking.

Stephanie Bilbro joined Austin Pets Alive! as the Director of Operations in 2018. With a background in the hospitality industry, Stephanie discovered her passion for animal welfare over 15 years ago when she began volunteering in her hometown’s animal shelter. Since then, her experience has ranged from shelter behavior and medical work, to managing a rural sanctuary for former laboratory animals, to serving as Shelter Manager at Wyoming’s largest open admission shelter before moving to Austin. In her time at APA!, Stephanie has overseen a variety of ever-growing operations teams where staff and volunteers work side-by-side on a daily basis to care for over 11,000 animals every year. Stephanie currently lives in south Austin with her senior dog, Eli, and her long-term foster pup, Ursula.

Rachel spent 4 years at Pima Animal Care Center (PACC) as a foster coordinator and behavioral-needs dogs case manager; embedded in high volume, open admission, progressive sheltering.

During her time at PACC, Rachel helped build one of the nation's largest big dog foster programs, hosted numerous dog foster apprenticeships, wrote articles and presented on dog foster and volunteer programs for Maddie’s Fund®, American Pets Alive! and the Missouri Coalition of Animal Care Organizations. In 2021, she worked with Arizona State University's Canine Science Collaboratory to coordinate a 40-dog study on the effects of foster care on shelter dogs.

In 2022, she authored, filmed and edited the official Maddie's University shelter handling course. She left PACC that Summer to assist outside animal welfare organizations with their own dog foster and volunteer programs. Since then she's worked with other shelters to implement dog handling and enrichment programs, train staff and volunteers on dog handling best practices, host adoption counseling trainings, analyze foster programs and compile reports on recommended changes/additions to said foster programs. Some of her clients include Santa Barbara County Animal Services, Seattle Animal Shelter and The SPCA Serving Erie County. She continues to work with Maddie's Fund as an instructor for their ILC dog foster course and has developed training materials for additional self-paced courses on Maddie's University.

Her favorite things in life are naughty dogs and bullet points in emails. She also makes silly YouTube videos sometimes.

Lindsay Layendecker began her career in animal welfare as a volunteer. She was a middle school teacher who began spending all her spare time and summer vacations at the shelter until finally one day, they offered her a job! That was back in 2015. Fast-forward to today, and Lindsay is the Director of Community Programs, overseeing JHS’s communications, public relations, grant program, humane education, and assisting with Florida Leaders in Lifesaving. Lindsay has been a speaker at the local, state and national level, and few things bring her more joy than helping shelters find solutions to save lives. Outside of work, Lindsay drinks too much Diet Coke, watches too many true crime documentaries, and fosters too many kittens. She shares her home with her dog Dudley, who is the living embodiment of the laughing/crying emoji, and her four cats, who tolerate his behavior.

After a decade of working with dogs in various fields (including municipal shelters, professional dog hiking, and fostering), Jackie Perro joined Hearts & Bones Rescue as the Adoption Program Manager in 2021. She was promoted to the Vice President of NY Rescue Programs in 2023. She currently oversees NY operations and is always looking for ways to build community and further the rescue's impact on its lifesaving mission. She lives in Queens with her husband, where she fosters dogs after the recent passing of her rescue dog, Phoebe. As a way of paying homage to her "spicy meatball", she's particularly fond of fostering dogs who might need a training boost in order to find their new home.

Regan Goins is the Outcomes Manager at Cincinnati Animal Care (CAC). Formerly she has occupied positions such as: Maddie's® Dog Foster Program advisor for American Pets Alive!, Dog Foster Manager at Austin Pets Alive!, and Operations Manager for the Humane Society of Delaware County. Right before Hurricane Harvey, Regan joined APA!'s staff, where she managed the dog foster team through a peak of 1,000 dogs in foster at one time. As a necessity created by Hurricane Harvey, Regan has also pioneered APA!'s initial behavioral foster program and specializes in building programs to achieve live outcomes for behavior dogs. Her matchmaking training and approach has resulted in countless success stories for those last-chance dogs.

Amanda began her journey with Gateway Pet Guardians in 2020, and has since become the Adoption and Foster Manager. She manages over 200 fosters and coordinates an average of 1050 adoptions annually. She helps market and match dogs with fosters and adopters and runs the Unicorn Foster Program where she provides extra perks and incentives to fosters who will take ‘harder to place’ dogs like a private Facebook group to provide specialized support, offer private in-home lessons with an approved trainer, training plans and so much more.

Michael Shikashio, CDBC, is the founder of AggressiveDog.com and focuses on teaching other professionals from around the world on how to successfully work aggression cases. He is a five-term president of the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants (IAABC) and was the Association of Professional Dog Trainers (APDT) Member of the Year in 2020.

 Michael is sought after for his expert opinion by numerous media outlets, including the New York Times, New York Post, Fox News, The List TV, Baltimore Sun, WebMD, Women’s Health Magazine, Real Simple Magazine, SiriusXM Radio, The Chronicle of the Dog, and Steve Dale’s Pet World. He also hosts the popular podcast show “The Bitey End of the Dog” where he chats with the foremost experts on dog aggression.

 He has been a featured keynote speaker at conferences, universities, and seminars in more than 200 cities and 14 different countries around the world, and offers a variety of educational opportunities on the topic of canine aggression, including the Aggression in Dogs Master Course and the annual Aggression in Dogs Conference.

Wailani Sung, MS, PhD, DVM, DACVB was formerly the Director of Behavior and Welfare Programs, San Francisco Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Dr. Wailani Sung obtained her Master’s degree, Doctorate in Psychology, and Doctorate in Veterinary Medicine from The University of Georgia College of Veterinary Medicine. She achieved her board certification in veterinary behavioral medicine. Dr. Sung provides behavior consultations for privately owned pets and also oversees the shelter behavior program at the San Francisco SPCA. Dr. Sung is a co-author of the book, “From Fearful to Fear Free”, in which she collaborated with America’s veterinarian Dr. Marty Becker, veterinary colleague Dr. Lisa Radosta, and renown trainer, Mikkel Becker. Dr. Sung also co-authored a chapter in “Decoding your Cat”. Dr. Sung has been a contributor to the websites, Pet Coach and PetMD. Dr. Sung has written chapters for the following veterinary textbooks: Behavior of Exotic Pets; Blackwell's Five-Minute Veterinary Consult Clinical Companion: Canine and Feline Behavior, 2nd Edition; Blackwell’s Five-Minute Veterinary Consult: Canine and Feline: 7th edition; Animal Behavior for Shelter Veterinarian and Staff, 2nd edition; Clinical Handbook of Feline Behavior Medicine. Dr. Sung was interviewed on the documentary, Cat Tales by NOVA: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/... and on the Netflix documentary, Inside the Mind of a Cat.

Joanna Pagel is the Operations Director and Behavior Manager of Shelby Humane with over 10 years of canine behavior and care experience. Her career path has taken her through a range of positions including service and working dog trainer, vet and grooming tech, owner of a pet dog training business, and various shelter positions and professional relationships. After beginning her career years ago in her hometown shelter, she now finds herself having come full circle back into the rescue world. With her experience in difficult behavior cases, community outreach, and group training scenarios, she found herself to be quite at home in her current position. She feels blessed to be able to offer a unique and thoroughly experienced perspective on the struggles that shelter animals and workers alike can face daily. Joanna enjoys her precious free time with her 3 rescues mutts finding new spots to hike, competing in various dog sports, or practicing their mid-day nap skills.

Dr. Joyce Voss received her Bachelor’s Degree in Human Biology from Stanford University, initially planning to become a physician.  Late in her undergraduate career, she had an opportunity to work with dogs on a clinical level, and was hooked on veterinary medicine since.  She received dual doctorate degrees, earning a DVM and a PhD in Pharmacology and Toxicology from the University of California at Davis in 2006.  She worked in general and emergency small animal practice for 10 years before transitioning to spay/neuter and shelter medicine at SICSA in 2016.  Since 2020, she has served as the Director of Veterinary Services and Animal Care overseeing the veterinary clinic and animal care and enrichment, and since 2023, has been reinventing and growing the behavior and foster programs.  She lives in the Dayton, OH area with her husband, Andrew, two teen sons, Aidan and Connor, and two cats, Purrcy Jackson and Piper.

Bobbie Bhambree (CDBC, CPDT-KA) is a Certified Dog Behavior Consultant and Director of Education at Behavior Vets. She is also a faculty member of CATCH Canine Trainers Academy and Agility University. Bobbie started her career in 2003 as a pet behavior counselor with the ASPCA Animal Behavior Center. While there, she implemented behavior modification programs for dogs surrendered by the public or seized by Humane Law Enforcement. In 2007, Bobbie joined the Humane Society of Westchester, spending the next nine years as their shelter trainer. She created and implemented dog training and enrichment programs, counseled adopters, trained volunteers, participated in community outreach programs, and performed evaluations.

 2016 Bobbie joined the North Shore Animal League America in Port Washington, NY as the Director of Pet Behavior. During her tenure there, she managed a team of canine and feline trainers who focused on developing behavior modification and enrichment programs for the animals in the shelter. She also deployed for the ASPCA Anti-Cruelty Behavior Team to work in the field, supporting the team with dog fighting busts, puppy mill cases, and hoarding cases. In addition to this work, she founded and directed her own company, DogCentric Dog Training, helping people whose pet dogs experienced a wide spectrum of canine behavior issues. Bobbie presented at the Lemonade Conference, hosted by IAABC and Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, and at the HeartDog International Wellbeing Summit in 2022. Bobbie is a co-creator of the Resilience Rainbow, a framework for resilience-building interventions.

 Over the years, Bobbie has very successfully competed in agility in various venues with several of her dogs including, Marvel who came in third for Performance Speed Jumping and Performance Grand Prix at Mid-Atlantic Regionals in 2019. Bobbie has authored several articles for the agility-focused publication, Clean Run. She is passionate about working with dog sports teams struggling with behavior issues. Bobbie regularly teaches behavior workshops for the dog sports community, including a recent project called Brain Camp.

 Bobbie currently shares her life with three terriers, one Pitbull, a border collie/whippet mix, a border collie/Croatian Sheepdog mix (Ziggy, Marvel, Heady Topper, Eleanor Rigby, Phuncky, and Drazen), and a very supportive husband in southern New Jersey.

Ferdie Yau (MA, CPDT-KA) is the Director of Shelter & Community Outreach and a Behavior Consultant for Behavior Vets. He also serves as the Staff Trainer at the Humane Society of Westchester and an instructor for CATCH Canine Trainers Academy. Ferdie is a former ecologist and holds an MA in Conservation Biology from Columbia University. He trained animals at the Central Park and Bronx Zoos before working with dogs and animal shelters. In his free time, Ferdie studies the lives of urban coyotes living in the New York City Metropolitan area. 

Devan Amundsen, CPDT-KA CBCC-KA, is a certified dog trainer and behavior consultant with over 10 years of experience working with not just dog owners, but dogs in shelters, assistance dogs, and other working dogs. Devan started as a volunteer training dogs at his local shelter, and since then has been a Kennel Technician, Dog Care Coordinator, Animal Control Officer, and Shelter Manager. Devan currently teaches college courses about dog training, dog behavior, kennel management, and animal sheltering at the Bachelor of Science and Associate of Science levels at Bergin College of Canine Studies in Sonoma County, California. Devan teaches approximately 25% of the Bachelor's degree program. Devan also helped modify the Bachelor of Science degree program, designing and instructing entirely new courses centered around animal sheltering and providing community support. Last year, Devan launched a pilot program at the university, assigning students to foster dogs pulled from shelters for the semester as part of their studies, then participating in placing those dogs into adoptive homes. The program continues to bring dogs from rescues into the program, specifically pregnant dogs who whelp and raise their puppies alongside the assistance dogs in training. In April of 2022, Devan joined the team at Oakland Animal Services as the Dog Behavior Coordinator. Beyond the day-to-day behavior work, the goal is to create programs and systems that can be replicated in other communities. This year, Animal Welfare United sponsored free group dog training classes in partnership with Bergin College. These goal is that these classes will serve as a pilot project for other communities to replicate.