Advantages of becoming a Puppy School Tutor

Our Puppy School tutor training course is incredible, and provides the following detailed training:

• two days of introductory face-to-face training;
• 25 hours of live online tuition - covering a range of topics from animal learning to managing people; 
• one-to-one video coaching with an experienced long-standing Puppy School tutor to develop technical skills;
• a 3-day practical course;
• and a further short correspondence course.

This comprehensive training covers all aspects of training and coaching puppies and owners, as well as running classes and learning all that is necessary for running and marketing a small business.  This allows new tutors to feel confident about progressing with their own Puppy School classes.

All tutors and associate tutors are assigned a regional manager who will guide, mentor and support them throughout their training, set up, and, subsequently, during any issues encountered as classes begin.

You will receive individual coaching on each technique and skill needed to teach puppy classes from an experienced regional manager within Puppy School.  This will be done remotely unless you live close by.

Continued coaching is provided as needed, to ensure you are sufficiently competent and confident before you run your first class.

Every tutor and associate tutor is assigned their own regional manager who will help guide them through their training and support them when running classes.  Regional managers are experienced tutors themselves and are always on hand for any further advice and guidance.  They will mentor you and conduct twice yearly visits to your classes, offering good advice and feedback to further improve your classes.

Regional teams meet often throughout the year and sometimes meet for fun social events, as well as grouping together for exciting, local, positive dog training workshops and seminars.

Thanks to an amazing sponsorship deal with Natures Menu, tutors are entitled to many fantastic benefits

All Puppy School clients receive a full-colour Puppy School manual, a packet of Natures Menu Country Hunter Superfood Bites (Puppy) Chicken with Venison and a 20% off food voucher direct to their door free of charge.  The Puppy School branded manual gives us a professional edge and contains extra information to help after lessons, together with homework tasks.  This saves tutors from the time and expense of printing out handouts weekly.  

As a tutor and as an associate tutor, you will be entitled to 25% off RRP on all Natures Menu products from www.naturesmenu.co.uk.  

With every 20% off voucher your client redeems, £5.00 worth of credit is added to the tutor's Natures Menu account allowing you purchase sale stock or stock up on goodies for your own dog (please note, credit accumulation is only available to full tutors and not associate tutors).

On top of all this, Natures Menu will further support you by sending you two free packets of the Natures Menu puppy treats per puppy, one to give to owners during their first classe and another for use in class.  Made with 95% meat, these treats are well accepted by all puppies and provide an excellent way to start owners off on their positive training journey.  It is possible to order more treats with any credits you earn from the voucher redemptions, giving you stock to sell in class to further encourage owners to buy and use good treats, while, in addition, providing the opportunity to make more profit from classes.

These benefits, both for tutors and clients, are fantastic and will undoubtedly help to make your business an attractive option for new puppy owners. 

In addition, Natures Menu sponsor our Puppy School Conference and are also a very good source of up-to-date nutrition education.

The Puppy School Intranet is the place to find everything you need for setting up and running classes.  Whether you need to know about insurance, marketing or how to run puppy meet-and-greets, there is a wealth of top quality, tried and trusted information at your fingertips via our clear and easy-to-use files on our intranet.

In addition, the private and dedicated Puppy School Facebook forum is a vibrant and informative way to keep up-to-date with what’s going on in the puppy training world, and a place to seek and read advice on a host of questions that come up in the course of people’s work within Puppy School. The collective wisdom of up to a 150 people who are deeply involved in the world of dog training and behaviour is a great resource, as well as being a fun, friendly place to gather support, ask questions, celebrate successes or post videos and photos.  There is also many years of previous posts that can be searched if you prefer anonymous investigation.

We also have two sister private forums, SuperPup and Puppy University, for those wanting specific advice or support from those running similar courses.

All established tutors are offered two free three-day puppy behaviour courses per year for the first three years. These courses are led by Nicole Harris, BA (Hons), PGDip CABC and Gwen Bailey BSc (Hons), who both are members of the Association of Pet Behaviour Counsellors and registered Clinical Animal Behaviourists with the Animal Behaviour Training Council.

Working with the latest science-based knowledge, our behavioural courses cover all subjects necessary to provide tutors with a comprehensive knowledge for helping owners with training and simple behaviour problems in puppies.

Puppy School runs at least two CPD courses each year, exclusively for tutors and associate tutors, where external speakers or internal speakers with a specialist knowledge are invited to give talks or workshops on their speciality.

Workshops, webinars and events for 2023/24 included:

• Advancing into Adults with Nicole Harris and Claire Luscombe 
• Pain in Dogs with Cushla Lamen
• Because You're Worth It (marketing that communicates your value) with Gretta Ford
• Social Media Support Sessions with Charlie Houghton

The Puppy School conference is run every two years and is a fun-packed long weekend event where we attend a range of workshops, try out new dog sports and have a chance to catch up with other tutors over a BBQ and drinks. It is a real family affair and it is a much anticipated event in the Puppy School diary. Our pet dogs are also encouraged to attend and get involved just as much as their owners – there’s always something new to try.

Puppy School’s 2024 Conference offered an array of seminars and workshops including:

• Introduction to Lost Dog Tracking with Claire Brown, K9 North
• Intorduction to Mantrailing with Jason Cortis, Worcester Dogs
• ACE Free Work with Sarah Fisher, Becky Howe & Vicki Watts
• Creating an Irresistible Brand: The Power of Personal Branding Photography with Anastasia Jobson
• Training Anti-poaching Dogs with Sandra Raw, Worcester Dogs

We offer follow-on courses such as the SuperPup course which is a fun way for owners to develop and practice the skills they learn in the Puppy School classes.  This keeps owners with Puppy School as their puppy grows and has proved a brilliant way to encourage owners to keep training and socialising after their initial training classes.

Puppy School tutors are able to continue their training with us to become Puppy University tutors and teach the university syllabus. Puppy University is designed as a follow-on course and will tackle many of the training challenges that owners face with their puppies as they head towards adolescence, as well as further developing their training techniques and skills. Full training includes a week of practical handling at a rescue shelter.

Puppy School is delighted to be recognised as a Practitioner Organisation for the Animal Behaviour and Training Council (ABTC).

The ABTC is the regulatory body that represents animal trainers and animal behaviour therapists to both the public and to legislative bodies. It is the only animal welfare charity that is primarily concerned with protecting the psychological welfare of animals undergoing training and behaviour activities.

Tutors and associate tutors who are actively running classes are able to take our assessment to join the ABTC register and become a recognised Animal Training Instructor.

Puppy School tutors have exclusive trade accounts deals with companies such as Tug-E-Nuff toys in which tutors receive great trade prices as well as, from time to time, free samples, such as complimentary demonstrative toys for classes.

Puppy School is sometimes able to obtain benefits such as discount off events such as conferences and other such educational events.

The Puppy Club is an incredible resource specifically for clients who book onto a Puppy School course.  It contains a wealth of information that is given exclusively to our clients.  Our competitors are unlikely to have a resource as in-depth and comprehensive, making it an excellent selling point for your classes.  

The Week-by-Week section gives notes, extra tips and videos of techniques for the puppy school classes.  

The Good Puppy Pages offer a whole range of advice on topics from puppy play biting to housetraining to sports to do with a puppy once they are older.

All bookings for classes are taken centrally via an automated booking system already set up with a merchant bank that takes credit card payments.  The systems deals with confirmation of place, sending out your venue details and other information, and collects important client details for you.  This saves you a lot of administration time and effort.

In a further attempt to save you time, we have a local website template setup and ready to go, for purchase at cost price, which can quickly be personalised with your details and information.  This can get you off to a flying start without the time-consuming and frustration of setting up and writing your own website.

Puppy School offers you a fully functioning website at a very competitive price.  It is primed and ready to sell your classes in your local area, with all copy written, beautiful original illustrations added, and booking page linked directly to the main Puppy School central booking system.  You can personalise it with your details and is customisable so you can add your own testimonials and gallery photos when you have them and add further courses or workshops as you offer them.

Puppy School is made up of many like-minded individuals.  We all want to work towards a better world for puppies and their owners, and we are all completely committed to science-based, positive training.  The forum is a friendly place and there is an ethos of encouragement for all rather than criticism. 

Attending the tutors training and subsequent courses puts you together with people with a common interest and many puppy tutors and associates have made lifelong friends through the organisation.