Our Team

Grace Huffman

Grace has been around dogs throughout her life. In many ways her life is centered around dogs. From training dogs, to relying on Medical Alert Service Dogs for daily tasks, to competing in National Agility competitions, dogs have been teammates, companions and life partners.

Grace’s home pack currently consists of four dogs each with their own special skills and gifts. She trains and competes in agility with her two Miniature Schnauzers Gus and Bernie, who qualified for nationals in his first year of competing! As well as her Standard Poodle, Rafiki, and her Sheltie, Bella, who is a NADAC Champion. Rafiki is also a working Medical Alert Dog and training for Water Fowl retrieval in her spare time.

At K9U Chicago Grace will teach all levels of Agility Training from puppies to competition and will be teaching group obedience training classes. Grace uses only positive training methods and believes in having fun while learning new skills that enhance the bond between dogs and their owners.

When not at K9U Chicago Grace volunteers with shelters and rescue groups in Naperville to help the disabled connect and train service dogs. She also founded Beard & Golden a hand-made custom clothing company providing dog gear and accessories.

Dawn Louis

A St. Louis native, Dawn comes to Chicago after graduating with honors from Lindenwood University. After receiving her degree in Biology, Dawn was a primate keeper for the St. Louis Zoo where she worked with apes, monkeys and lemurs. Training dogs was a natural extension of her education and personal interests, having been around dogs all her life. Her experience also includes working with veterinarians to rehabilitate wildlife.

Dawn is training dogs in our Day Camp and Puppy Obedience classes. She also loves spending time with new parents in the Puppy Play sessions on Saturday morning and is happy to share socialization tips with everyone who attends.

In her free time Dawn has enjoyed being involved with many different dog rescue communities and looks forward to making new friends and finding specials was to help Chicago area dogs in need find their forever homes.

Sarah Szymborski

Sarah lives an adventurous life and her dogs REALLY love that about her, so do we!
She channels this love in lots of fun ways that give her pups a positive outlet for their energy and a chance to deepen the bond she has with her home pack that includes: Luna, an American Pitbull Terrier/Husky mix, Atlas, a Mountain Cur/Great Pyrenees mix and Data, a border collie. Together they enjoy agility, disc, dock diving, barn hunts and herding activities all designed to give them an amazing mental and physical workout.

As a trainer at K9 University Chicago, Sarah will be teaching agility and obedience classes from Puppy to Advanced levels, as well as some targeted classes focusing on relationship bonding and everyday fun activities you can do with your dog to reinforce what you have learned in class. Sarah believes that positive relationship-based training is key to building a fun, rewarding and exciting lifelong connection with your dog.

Sarah has experience working with a wide variety of dog behaviors, personalities and breeds.