Kimia Pourmehr, Research Assistant since 2022

If there’s a dog around, Kimia is probably already involved! Between raising guide dog puppies, working as a dog walker, volunteering with our lab, and beginning a professional dog training apprenticeship, most of her time is spent helping dogs and people grow together.

But Kimia is a secret cat person at heart! As a youngster, her first exposure to animal training was The Amazing Acro-Cats, a troupe of rescued house cats trained to ride skateboards, jump through hoops, balance on balls, and even play musical instruments. She went home with a clicker, a target stick, and a mission and promptly trained her own cat, Rocket, to jump up, on, and over various and sundry household items.

These days, Kimia is a confident peer leader, a flexible trainer, and a sharp researcher - we like to think spending four years with us had a little something to do with that.