Meet Our Team
Your Camano Island Kennels hosts are Dianna and Jason Young. Dianna is a certified professional trainer and canine behaviorist with more than 20 years of experience who combines the best of European and American traditions in her dog training programs. She was born and reared in the Pacific Northwest, but began her career in Germany in the 1980s, where she served three years of apprenticeship under several skilled master trainers. There, she studied and participated in the European style of training dogs for police-service work, security work, scent detection, personal protection, tracking and search and rescue. Dianna returned to the United States, where she enrolled in a nationally accredited school for professional dog trainers and also studied all facets of animal husbandry. Upon completing her studies there, she worked and studied for several years in animal-related fields on the East Coast, including six years as a veterinary technician in New York and several years as an apprentice trainer at one of the top working-dog kennels in New England. She is an approved evaluator for the American Kennel Club's Canine Good Citizen Program.
Jason's introduction to highly trained canines and many of their uses came in combat in the Middle East, where he served multiple tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan as a U.S. Army Green Beret. He and the men he supervised came to love and appreciate these dogs for their valuable contributions to the combat team and to the safety and security of the people on it.
Mark Schneeberger has been training dogs professionally for the last two years. He is a graduate of a nationally accredited dog trainers' school in Ohio, where he was born and raised (Cleveland to be exact), and traveled all the way to Washington State specifically to train for Camano Island Kennels.
Mark loves all animals, big or small. But most of all, Mark loves dogs. He was introduced to dog training when he purchased his first puppy to raise on his own. The enjoyment he found in working with his dog led him down the path to becoming a full-time professional trainer and handler.
In working with pet dogs, Mark's goal is always to create a well-balanced, confident animal that understands his or her place within the family unit. He is ready and willing to work with any dog, regardless of breed or temperament. In his free time, Mark is an avid reader and fisherman, as well as a lifelong sports fan. He looks forward to meeting you and your canine companion, and to helping establish a meaningful relationship between the two of you.
Shawn Schurman is a local woman, born in Everett and raised there by her pet-store-owning mom. Dogs have always been a part of her life, but she didn’t grow up expecting to enter the grooming profession.
Somehow, Shawn found her way to Maser’s Academy of Fine Grooming in Kenmore, where she discovered that grooming was her true calling. Shawn graduated in 1990, and opened her own shop in 1994, called Whiskers and Wiggles. She was forced to stop working temporarily because of an injury, and then – after a few in-between jobs – she opened a highly successful shop in Marysville in 2005. She called it Shampooches Pet Styling, and it attracted enthusiastic clientele from as far away as Blaine. In 2009, Shawn accomplished a goal that many groomers don’t even attempt. She received her Master Certification. The testing process includes four hands-on grooming tests and a series of written tests. Shawn is one of only a handful of Washington groomers to hold this certificate.
Shawn operated Shampooches Pet Styling until 2010, and now she is here with us, commuting from Marysville where she lives with her two teenage daughters and three dogs. In her free time she reads and works in her yard and volunteers at a local animal shelter, grooming animals that are getting ready for adoption. Every year, she attends the Pacific Northwest Grooming Show in Tacoma to extend her education and keep up with the latest grooming trends.
