About What A Great Dog!

A training center in Richardson

What A Great Dog! is a dog training center at 304 S Cottonwood Dr in Richardson, its new permanent home. Maureen Patin founded it in 2007 as What a Good Dog! Training in a horse barn in Prosper, after leaving a long executive career with PepsiCo; she brought experience in competitive obedience and in teaching basic obedience classes for a parks and recreation department. Training uses positive, reward-based methods, and Manners classes start with clicker work, name games, leash handling and settling on a mat.

Programs

Puppy programs run from Great Puppy! Day School and Puppy Preschool to Manners 1, 2 and 3, with Manners workshops, the AKC Canine Good Citizen program and Great Dog Day School. Sport and enrichment classes cover nose work levels 101 to 103, rally and competitive obedience, therapy team foundations and trick dog classes. Private lessons address special skills or persistent behavior problems, and a separation anxiety training program is available. Training comes in facility, in home, as drop-off, or online through self-paced classes and seminars, including an online kids-and-dogs seminar. The center also runs seminars, trials and a retail shop.

What owners say

One student wrote after Manners 1 that the trainer "was able to explain things in a way that helped you relate to your dog's behavior."