Our department uses USPCA it's been around for years , is a readily acceptable certification and I feel it is a good minimual standard . It's certification is open to the public and usually draws a good number of people to watch it . This has been very good for public relations and has actually helped start new K9 programs because of it . Opposing attourneys so far have accepted the certification and moved on . I don't think they want to open the door to all of the awards a K9 team might have . Usually they go after the training , officers history and how the K9 was deployed .

The competition part of it I originally hated my first year on . For the same reasons others do . I saw too many K9's do well that I knew were not very good street dogs . I also had a great street dog but didn't win any awards during certification my first year.

I now agree with Jon Richey that competition in a certification can be a good thing for all of the reasons he stated . It's all on where your priorities are and street work should always come first. I compete there to . I want to keep more officers safe , find more badguys , find more dope , recover more evidence , etc. then the other K9 teams .

Winning in competion along with being very successful on the street enabled us to have a large K9 Unit (21 dogs , currently down from that due to transfers). The PR value of winning is very important to our administration and the public loves it and are very supportive of us. Our history of winning USPCA National Dept. and Individual Championships caused several civilians to form a foundation for us that has purchased several K9's , lots of equipment , and sent numerous teams to training seminars .

With that being said certification is a minimal standard and not the measure of a good street dog . When faced with having our K9 Unit cut in half this year (mayor's idea) over 100 Officers and numerous civilans showed up to the council meeting . Several Officers spoke about the good things our K9's did on the street for them and how they felt there safety would be jepardized if the unit was cut . Our certification or success in competition was never brought up . The outcome of the meeting was no cuts and we just found out we will be adding 3 new K9's in March all purchased by our foundation.

This is the type of conversation that I hoped would occur from my initial post. We went several years w/o any k-9 association affiliation. The standard that we trained to parelled the standards set by NAPWDA. The vision or charge to me from the chief was to create or convert the existing program into one with "social yet functional k-9 teams". Being associated with the USPCA was not an option as the perception of the chief was that those were show dogs not real working dogs. That was simply his opinion and not my battle to fight at that time.

We sought out different organizations and eventually have had affiliations with NAPWDA, NNDDA and now AWD(American Working Dog).

During our time with no k-9 association affiliation we maintained sound training and kept very good records. Because we have an in-house training program we did little to no training with other departments. Although there were no trainers egos to get bruised (other than mine)we were training in vacuum. No influx of new ideas and handlers did not get to see or compare themselves to outside K-9 teams. To me there is a real value in comparing or measuring yourself against another team. I agree with all the positive things that can come out of competition but I question it's value as part of a certification.

To me the pass fail system makes a lot sense. Either they did it or they didn't. However, I really like the idea of competing. AWD hosts a competition which has sparked the interest of several of my handlers. My understanding is that the scenarios are real-life types of situations and teams are not judged by whether the dog sits straight or not.

On another note given a limited amount of training time it is imperative to me that preparing for certification not keep us from the work that we do on the street.

I admire the folks who have trialed their dogs in many styles or venues. It seems that the folks that can do this are very experienced and quite knowlegable about training. IMO the average handler doesn't have the resources or motivation to accomplish such an undertaking. That is unfortunate. You all have given me a lot to think about

Howard ,
I'd liked to see something like what the American Working Dog association is doing with having more real to life scenerios worked into to the USPCA certification .

My idea has been to have a Yearly National Trial perhaps at our yearly National Training Seminar involving reallife scenerios , decoys and backup are the judges . The scenerios are different each year and unknown to the K9 teams until they get there. K9 teams are then judged on tactics, control of dog and dogs working ability . K9 teams going to National Training Seminar can choose to either particpate in the competition and be judged or just go through the scenerios as a training experiance and not be judged. Those competing can be eligable for awards and also go on to compete in a best overall K9 (combination of score in this event and score at the National PD1 trail later in the year.) if they choose to go there.

I think this would motivate more K9 teams to train for the street not just certification and it would bring personal gratification to me because it would expose some of the dogs that lack street ability. I think it would add credibilty to our association also showing we are working harder to show reallife performance and not putting so much on the perfect sit or pattern on a box search(pet peeves of mine).

I'm all for more real life certifications I just don't like pass/fail tests because there are too many people that will train just enough to pass and not to excell because there is no payoff.

Excellent thread. In our area, most agencies either go with NAPWDA or USPCA (besides the state standards). The handlers in my training group try to do all training in life like scenerios. We try to change things up quite a bit to make it interesting for everyone and to keep it from getting stale. Our group will try to hook up with other groups every couple of months to train with them and invite any group to hook up with us. We do a lot of "simunition" stuff. Sure makes ya pucker a little more when the guy your tracking (training) has a weapon. Those sim rounds hurt like hell. Keeps ya on your toes a little more doing building searchs, etc...
By doing these types of exercises, we can also get other officers (non-K9)involved. They enjoy it and get some training out of it too.
I dont know why, but it seems that most of the USPCA guys in the area are the ones that wont train with anyone else. They spend their first couple of hours of training each week training for USPCA competition/certification stuff. We've hooked up with a few of their groups, but usually wait til after their initial stuff is done.
Just glad to hear that everyone is at least training.
John

John ,

Those are the stories I hate to hear , handlers too caught up in competing/certifying they neglect doing more real to life training.

I met some officers from another state that all they did was certification/competition training . They thought this prepared them for the streets. They were with us for a week and we threw some more life like scenerios at them and they were stunned. They saw there weaknesses in training and left with a whole new training philosophy . They also seemed to have alot more fun .

I agree simunitions does up things a notch or two when you but it into a training session. I like to use simunitions and blanks(tactical movement under gunfire) quite abit when I get the chance to run some of our training days.

Our whole state is almost entirely USPCA . I got permission to go to Wisconsin and certify NAPWDA just to see what it's like but I had to put my partner down so I'm putting it off a year til I get my new dog straightened away. I'll certify USPCA(manditory) this year but that's it.