Please go here for an explanation of what we do.

You can see the Primer for all the topics we cover. Obviously that is a lot, but thankfully, as we lay out in the RCOC landing page, we do NOT expect owners to read the Primer or know all of this content; they should be learning and practicing these concepts gradually over the first few months and years with their dog, learning from books (cf. Further Educational Resources), classes, and professional trainers.

Rather, the RCOC is designed for you to learn as you go. Specifically, every question on the RCOC exam is linked to the relevant Primer chapters, so that owners can easily look up and study the relevant content. You are meant to: (1) read the scenario on the RCOC; (2) refer to the relevant chapter in the Primer; (3) study that chapter with the scenario in mind; and finally (4) go back and answer the question when you’re ready; before continuing on to the next question/scenario.

By giving you a practical situation to apply the concepts to, we hope to both make the content more digestible. As we lay out in our mission, our primary goal is, ultimately, not to teach owners everything, but rather to EXPOSE owners to these concepts, and force them to ENGAGE with them by confronting real-world situations. Our hope is that doing so will help owners realize the significance of their knowledge gaps, and thereby encourage more of them to continue their education.

No! You can take as long as you need, and can leave and come back as many times as you want, even over several days or weeks.

YES please do! As we lay out in the RCOC landing page, the exam is designed to be taken alongside referencing the Primer. Please see that page for further explanation of how that works.

There is a $28 certification fee IF and only if you pass the exam; you will not be charged if you do not pass the exam.

The fee is processed at the end of the exam – if anyone contacts you about RCO certification outside of the exam, such as by email, asking for any sort of payment, that is a scam, do not comply, and please forward the email to us.RCO certification happens entirely in the exam platform, and verification is done by requirers directly only through our requirer portal.

There is a $28 certification fee IF and only if you pass the exam; you will not be charged if you do not pass the exam.

The RCOC is meant to start an educational journey that we hope will lead to the AKC Canine Good Citizen (CGC) test. Therefore if you already have your CGC certification, we will automatically give you RCO Certification. All you have to do is go here and submit a request!

The RCO Primer and RCOC are a team effort, the culmination of two years and over two thousand hours of work from a series of trainers and handlers with diverse backgrounds but a shared commitment to better lives for dogs through broader owner education! You can see everyone who has contributed to the work here: Team & Contributors!

And we’re not done! The Primer is a living document – we are constantly reviewing, editing, revising, and expanding it, every single day! If you would like to contribute, or just have some suggestions, please reach out! You can contact us any time here: https://goodowners.dog/contact-us/

Yes – Everything we cover in our educational materials, which are designed for brand new dog owners, is exclusively restricted to the R+ quadrant of conditioning stimuli. Particularly given that the target audience of the RCOC and Good Owners Primer are handlers with limited-to-no dog training education or experience, we believe that it would be inappropriate to equip them with tools outside of that domain. As such, we strive to be compliant with the most widely-accepted interpretations of Force-Free and R+ approaches, guidelines, and standards (as canine ethology is an actively-evolving field, there is always trainer-to-trainer variation in practices, even amongst the most experienced trainers following the same core philosophy). If you are unsure, you can review the content we cover here: RCO Primer.

Even if you are not an R+ trainer however, we believe the RCOC will still very much meet your needs. We have tried to restrict ourselves to the most basic, core, bare minimum concepts for which there is the broadest consensus across training and research communities. We think you will find that even if you are not a force-free/R+ trainer, that for the topics we cover – and the audience we address – here, most trainers would (hopefully) exclusively use positive reinforcement anyway. Remember: our audience is brand new dog owners, trying to start them on their learning journey; even if you as a professional trainer include aversive methods in your toolkit, we hope you can agree that the average new dog owner is not capable of responsibly using those tools.

Our focus is, frankly, on improving the least-common-denominator among dog owners, on raising the bar from a very low level: so many dog owners know almost nothing, don’t even realize it, and dogs are suffering at a tremendous scale because of that ignorance.

If you’re not sure, we encourage you to review our practices in the RCO Primer. Practice matters more than labels. While of course no two trainers will agree on everything, we believe that most experienced, reputable trainers following the latest behavioral research will find 90+% of our content amenable – and the remaining 10% tolerable – and therefore a suitable introduction for their clients.

Congratulations! You can share your certification with any ‘requirers’ (trainers, breeders, adoption centers or rescues, landlords, roommates, Airbnb hosts, etc.) by sending them these links: 

The next step is to continue on your learning journey! We hope that the RCOC and RCO Primer have illustrated how important it is to learn how to properly handle, raise, care for, and train your puppy and adult dog, and given you a roadmap for what to do next. From here, we recommend:

• Continue to study and refer back to the RCO Primer as a reference.
• Read some introductory books! We have a list of suggested reading in the Further Educational Resources page.
• Take classes! We strongly recommend at MINIMUM one 6-12 week basic obedience course.
• Work with a trainer. As we repeatedly illustrate in the RCO Primer and RCOC exam, even a few sessions with a trainer will help you learn and improve massively in how you interact with your dog.

RCO Certification lasts for 3 years from the date you pass.

Why does it expire? Because we all forget things! Repeating the exam, and re-studying if necessary to pass it, is a great way to reinforce these concepts.

Remember: we are testing the minimum that any owner must know: if you can’t pass the exam, without studying, in 15-30 minutes, then you need some refreshing! This is NOT optional stuff!

In addition, while we limit ourselves to the most well-established practices and principles, behavioral science is very much an active research field, and every month we are learning new things that change how we thing about canine psychology; over time, our practices will update, and you should be reasonably up on the latest.

So many reasons! Please see our mission page for both: (a) how the RCOC exam is designed to improve owner education; and (b) a host of added benefits for Breeders, Trainers, and Adoption Centers specifically. See our mission page for more detail, or if you’d like to speak to us directly to learn more, just contact us – we’re always happy to hop on a quick call or email.

Many breeders and adoption centers, recognizing the endemic owner education problem we face, send owners home with an educational packet, or give their owners a 2-3 hours presentation on basics. 

That is a wonderful thing to do, but unfortunately, as I’m sure you experience, too few owners take that education to heart. Their lives are busy, they’re distracted, the kids are running around. They mean well, and intend to remember what you said and learn more, but after a few days or weeks they inevitably forget.

That is why we created the RCOC. It is designed to force owners to engage with the material. We don’t expect them to learn it all; rather, our goal is to really make them realize the consequences of their gaps in knowledge, to hopefully spur some portion of them to go on to take their education seriously.

Owners may mean well, but they live busy lives. No matter how much you ask that they read a book, take a class, or pass the RCOC, they are not always going to do it.

As a result, we recommend that you either require the RCOC, or strongly incentivize it, such as with a preferential waiting list spot, a discount, or waived fees.

If you’d like to talk to us about your situation, how you’re thinking of using the RCOC, and get some ideas or guidance on how best to implement it, feel free to reach out – we’re always happy to hop on a quick call or email!

No. The RCOC is supported through a $28 certification fee paid by dog owners who pass the exam. There is no cost to the trainer/adoption center/breeder to require or verify that an owner has passed the RCOC.