Lucy Newton, Faculty (Tracking)

Lucy Newton (she/her) has been training dogs and teaching dog training almost all her life. She was a search & rescue dog trainer, handler, and instructor and she trained numerous personal dogs for wilderness search and rescue, as well as land and water human remains detection. Working with very active wilderness SAR teams, she has worked on a large number of missing person cases in both urban and very remote wilderness locations. She has served as an instructor and training officer and continues to provide training to search and rescue dog handlers and their canines.

Lucy also worked as a full-time police sergeant and police canine handler and handled several dual-purpose patrol/narcotics canines for her police department. Lucy has raised and trained all of her working dogs from puppies. She was a state-certified police canine training instructor and served as a field training officer for her department. Lucy's dogs have been recognized with awards for life-saving search and rescue finds and her dogs have also had successful finds in human remains detection, evidence recovery, and narcotics detection.

In 2011 Lucy took a full-time position as an instructor and trainer for the Randy Hare School for Dog Trainers teaching detection trainer schools and training dogs for law enforcement, military, and professional dog trainers. In addition, Lucy also has served as a consultant and trainer for a Colorado-based business that trains dogs to detect a wide variety of plant and animal products important to conservation research projects. She has also worked with several truffle farm growers training truffle detection dogs.

In 2017 Lucy re-located to North Carolina, where she continues to offer high-level training and instruction to police, search and rescue, working, and sport dog handlers. Through her business, Front Sight K-9, Lucy offers board and train programs for sport and working dogs. She also provides coaching for students involved in various dog sports, primarily in obedience, tracking, and nosework.

In addition to training dogs for police and search and rescue, Lucy competes in a variety of sports with her own dogs. Her now-retired police patrol/narcotics detection partner, Steel, has the distinction of having achieved an AKC Tracking Championship as well as an IPO TR1 title in addition to having been a certified police tracking dog. Lucy has achieved titles on her dogs in obedience, tracking, and IGP/schutzhund. She also has served as a National Association of Canine Nose Work judge.

Lucy is currently the service dog trainer for American Humane's Pups4Patriots Program. Lucy trains green dogs to be service dogs for veterans experiencing post-traumatic stress. The dogs reside with her until fully trained and then Lucy conducts a residential training camp where the dogs are paired with their veterans and the veterans learn to handle their dogs. Lucy teaches the veterans positive reinforcement training techniques in order to teach them how to maintain and improve upon their dog's training. These training R+ techniques also serve as an excellent mechanism to help the veterans cope with their PTS as well.

Lucy has taught a variety of clinics throughout the United States and Canada. She currently offers various seminars focusing on aspects of tracking, nosework/detection, or scent theory and dynamics. Regardless of the venue, Lucy emphasizes a training philosophy that allows the dog to satisfy his drive and control his own avenue to reinforcement. Her goal is to create high drive, thinking working and sport dogs that can work independently of the handler and can be accurate and successful under a variety of conditions.

Lucy also offers private coaching to sport dog handlers, specializing in helping handlers understand how dogs communicate and learn in order to create better performances as well as develop a better working relationship regardless of the venue.

Pronouns: Lucy goes by she/her.