Our Staff

Owner, CEO

Dr. Ken Schoolmeester

I couldn’t decide on a major, so it chose me. I began my veterinary journey in a tiny drug store during my early college days, as I was bored pricing jar after jar with a ticket gun, a black dog walked up and licked my face. I couldn’t believe that a dog was in the store. I rushed to follow it as it rounded the aisle; however, it seemed to have disappeared. I looked all over the store and even went outside, but no other employee had seen the dog. My mother had told me from the time that I was a small boy that I would be a veterinarian, it seemed like it was time to heed her advice and fill those shoes.

After completing my veterinary degree at Ohio State, I moved to Greensboro, NC and after about a year and a half, I decided to take an independent step and open my own veterinary practice. Twenty-three rewarding years later, changes in my personal life brought me to Charlotte where I opened Stonecrest Veterinary Clinic. Seven years later, I took a big leap and expanded with a second practice and opened South End Veterinary Clinic in the Uptown area. As my existing clients at Stonecrest continued to expand with new or additional pets, my space at Stonecrest could not, so I opened a third location - Ballantyne Veterinary Hospital just a few minutes south on Johnston Road between Marvin and Audrey Kell.

It has been a gratifying and fulfilling journey with many successes and educational failures along the way. More than three decades later, I enjoy each day working alongside my staff and interacting with clients and their pets and look forward totomorrow.

Thank you for the opportunity,

Dr. Ken Schoolmeester

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Practice Managers and Veterinarians

Dr. Jenna Blake , DVM

Dr. Blake was born and raised in Virginia where she attended the University of Richmond for her undergraduate degree. She then moved to the great white north to attend Michigan State University for veterinary school (Go Spartans!). Her husband and she are both avid MSU fans. She practiced in Michigan until 2007 when she convinced her husband to move where it was warm. She started practicing at the Stonecrest location in July of 2007 and also frequents our Ballantyne location on Monday's.

She also has two young children that keep her very busy when not at the clinics.

Dr. Blake loves interacting with the clients and working in a fun, casual atmosphere.

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Dr. Jenn Merlo , DVM - Practice Manager, South End

Dr. Merlo is a born and raised “Jersey Girl” hailing from Manalapan, New Jersey. She attended the University of Delaware where shereceived her Bachelor’s degree in Animal Science. After undergrad, Dr Merlo attended The Ohio State University (Go Buckeyes!) where she received her D.V.M. After vet school she completed a one year rotating equine internship at Mid-Atlantic Equine Medical Center. She then moved on to Raleigh, NC, where she trained at NC State University in Equine Internal Medicine. After three years of long and grueling hours she transitioned into small animal medicine and moved to Charlotte NC, where she met her husband, Jeff. She joined our locations in April of 2009.

She also has two four-legged children…a boxer named Duncan and a golden retriever named Katie. Dr. Merlo continues to interact with horses in her spare time and through volunteer work with rescue organizations.

Dr. Merlo loves the casual and fun feeling that the clinics harbor. She loves interacting with clients and has a special interest in internal medicine and pediatrics.

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Dr. Susan Murray , DVM

Dr. Susan Murray was born and raised in Kentucky, the land of fast horses and beautiful women, or is it the other way around? At any rate, when her childhood dreams of being a horse or a running back in the NFL didn't materialize, she embarked on the path to her true calling - veterinary medicine.

After completing a B.S. in biochemistry at Western Kentucky University, she left bucolic Kentucky for the bright lights of L.A. (Lower Alabama) where she completed her D.V.M. at Auburn University. After finishing a preceptorship in small animal medicine in Nashville, TN, she was lured to Charlotte by the beauty of the poppies along I-485. Following the same logic, if you can call it that, she and her husband, Mike, bought a house and some land in Waxhaw solely because of the spiderwort that was in bloom at the time. Needless to say, both she and her husband enjoy the great outdoors, both plants and animals. They also enjoy travelling and learning about other cultures. Dr. Murray is a voracious reader and if you enjoy long, esoteric conversations about Elizabethan England- she’s your gal!

Dr. Murray is vehement about providing excellent care to her patients and their families. She feels fortunate to work with other team members who share her passion.

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Dr. Will Pressly , DVM - Practice Manager, Ballantyne

Dr. Pressly was born in Atlanta and has been a Southerner his entire life. He has lived in Charlotte for 30 plus years and graduated from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte in 1992 with a Bachelor of Arts in History/Religion. Soon after graduation, he went out to Colorado to live on a dude ranch. After several months of being there, he wasplaced in charge of caring for a herd of horses. This immediately sparked his interest, and from then on, he knew he wanted to spend his life working with animals. Dr. Pressly then headed to the Caribbean to attend Ross University’s Vet school and graduated in 1998. He then immediately went to work as a Large Animal Veterinarian and loved it! However, in 2001 Dr. Pressly made the transition to Small Animal Medicine and was an emergency vet (yes just like on TV) until 2004. From there, he practiced at Banfield,The Pet Hospital in Matthews as Chief of Staff and Partner Doctor.
Dr. Pressly’s passion is being everything to his patients from pediatrics to geriatrics and their families. His special interests are in orthopedics, lameness, and ultrasound.
In his free time, Dr. Pressly loves to spend time with his wonderful wife, Rhonda, and their three lovely daughters. Three cats and two dogs, Priscilla, a black lab, and Amber, a Jack Russell, complete their family.
Dr. Pressly is truly excited to be a part of and bring his experiences to Mixed Pet Veterinary Hospitals at Stonecrest, Ballantyne, and South End. He looks forward to getting to know you all!

Veterinarian Assistant Team

Michelle Braswell , Veterinary Assistant

Michelle has been working in the veterinary field for 4 years. She and her fiancé, Jonathon both grew up in the Carolinas. They both enjoy spending time outdoors; Michelle loves the summer and spends most of her free time at the pool.

Michelle has only one pet...at the moment! Nala is a two year old yellow lab. She was found as a stray in a backyard and she spends most of her time chasing geese in their pond and sun bathing (like her mom!).

Michelle's favorite thing about working at the clinic is getting to know the pets and their owners. She also enjoys working with the staff and doctors. When asked about her most humorous experience, she said “there is never a dull moment in the clinic. Everyone is always cutting up and playing jokes on each other."

Crystal Cook , Registered Veterinary Technician

Crystal was born in Waxhaw, NC. She spent most of her childhood in Matthews, NC. Crystal has been in the veterinary field since 2003. After working in the field for three years Crystal decided to pursue her degree as a registered animal nurse and began her studies at Gwinnett Technical College in Lawrenceville, GA. The Veterinary Technology program at Gwinnett Tech was by far one of the most challenging experiences Crystal has ever been through, and after three years of dedicated studying, Crystal graduated at the top of her class with a degree and became a Registered Veterinary Technician. After graduating college, Crystal moved back home to North Carolina to be closer to her family and began working with the Mixed Pet family in June 2009.

Crystal has three very adorable pets.

Beru (named after Aunt Beru from Star Wars!) is a seven-year-old German Shephard that Crystal rescued. Beru has an amazing personality, and is the sweetest dog in the world! Her favorite hobbies include pulling loaves of bread of the counter and eating them, chasing the cats, and watching her favorite Star Wars movies.

Kit Fisto (named after a jedi) is a one-year-old orange tabby cat. Kit Fisto is a spunky little cat and loves to be held on his back like a baby. Kit Fisto's favorite hobbies include teasing Beru, running around the house like a tornado and pulling things out of the trashcan.

Casper (named after the ghost) is a very friendly cat! Casper is a three-year-old flame point cat. Casper has mellowed out in his older age. His favorite hobbies include sleeping for 22 hours every day, begging for attention and meowing. (If only he liked lasagna!)

Crystal loves going to work everyday. Every day brings a new challenge, and she feels guaranteed to go home feeling accomplished each night. Crystal especially loves answering clients questions and educating clients about their pets that they love so dearly. By doing this she is allowing them to provide the optimal care that they want to give to their furry family members!

Every single day is so much fun in the Mixed Pet world. Crystal enjoys the witty humor amongst the staff members and enjoys the fact that everyone is on board with her quirky sense of humor! Laughter is the best medicine and "Stressed" is "Desserts" spelled backwards!

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Rochelle Haack , Veterinarian Assistant

Rochelle is from Indiana and a proud Purdue Boilermaker with B.S. degree. She loves Charlotte, NC and has called it home since 1990. The beaches are her favorite thing about the Carolinas. She has two adopted children from Khabarovsk, Russia, at the ages of 3 1/2 years old and 8 1/2 months. The wonderful children, Noah and Sarah are now teenagers, loved by a very proud mom.
Rochelle has two miniature dachshunds in her family. Minnie is the oldest next to the "pup" Cooper who is the most sweet-hearted dog ever. They are lovable and silly (much like Rochelle). They bring much joy to her and the kids. Watching them all play together is a hoot.
Her favorite aspect in regards to working at the clinic is holding puppies. She enjoys cuddling pets and sweet talking them. During their visits, she takes pleasure in helping them relax as though they were her own pets. She takes tremendous pride in gently caring for the sick (which is why she is the patient care coordinator).
She has cultivated lifelong friendships and learned a lot at the clinics.
Don't let the crowd fool you, Rochelle and staff can be very silly at times. There is one person that plays many jokes on others....but Rochelle isn't naming any names.

Alison Harrell , Veterinary Assistant Manager/ Surgical Assistant

Alison was born in Charlotte and moved to Monroe in 1996. Alison now resides in Indian Trail with her husband of 7 years, Dave, and their beautiful daughter, Tyler Nicole who is 3 1/2 years old. She grew up in a very close-nit family. They are very important to her and she feels very lucky that all of them live nearby in Mecklenburg and Union County.

Alison has always been an animal lover, even as a child. She has been working in the veterinary field for 9 years. It's something she always knew she would do someday. She finds her job extremely rewarding, but also challenging at times. She wakes up everyday and looks forward to going to work in such a fun environment with humorous coworkers whom she considers to be her very best friends. Mostly, Alison enjoys working with innocent and helpless animals and loves being able to bring them comfort through surgery, treatment, or just a scratch behind the ears. We cannot see Alison doing anything else as a profession and we are delighted that she has been at our Stonecrest location for almost five years and we look forward to many more years with her.

Alison blames this job for the fact that she lives in a "Zoo"! She has seven pets YIKES! Sampson is her twelve-year-old Yellow Lab, and voted the best dog EVER (by Alison, of course). Bailey is her four-year-old Pembroke Welsh Corgi. She's kind of their "special needs baby", born with no tear ducts in her eyes and needs constant special attention, but also....the best dog EVER! She also has five cats – Rescue (a.k.a. "Punkin") is her ten-year-old orange tabby domestic short hair (DSH), Stone is the six-year-old brown tabby & white DSH, Dusty is a three-year-old, long haired diluted calico. Then there's Aspen who is her 1 year old, solid white DSH, and last, but not least there's Rudy, who is the baby. He's a one-year-old orange and white tabby DSH. It's definately a house full, but she loves every one of them with all her heart and wouldn't have it any other way.

Some of Alison's hobbies and interests include playing pool with her husband, riding their motorcycle on warm days, taking their boat out on the lake in the summer and going tubing, taking her daughter to the park, or just simply hanging out with friends and family.

When asked what Alison’s most humorous experience at work was, she said "Wow, it's really hard to come up with one specific thing. Everyday there is something crazy going on. We are a very close group of girls, who probably know eachother a little too well. We are all so very different, but yet we get along great and work really, really well together. We have a lot of inside jokes. Not one day goes by that all of us are not laughing about something. It really is a lot of fun!"

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Cris Molina , Veterinary Assistant

Cris was born in Los Angeles California, and has lived in North Carolina for 15 years, yet a small part of her still considers California home. At age 16, she started working at a pet salon; from that time on she knew she would always work with animals. She worked with Dr. Schoolmeester at his Greensboro clinic before transferring to Charlotte. She has worked at Mixed Pet for the past three years.

Cris has 4 cats. Skittles is a fat and sassy 12-½ year old calico. Mama Kitty is a 4-year-old grey and white domestic shorthair. She and Benny were both found at the same school, the jury is still out as to whether or not she is Benny’s mother. Benny is a sleek black 3-year-old male domestic shorthair. And lastly, there’s Charlotte a medium haired multi colored tabby who truly believes she’s human.

She loves all animals, but especially partial to kittens. Working for a vet allows her to get her “kitten fix” so she doesn’t end up with 50 of her own! She also loves that every one works together so well, that she looks forward to coming in every day. She says that everyone treats each other as if they were family and at least once a day she finds something to laugh about. There are many jokesters in the Mixed Pet family.

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Sarah von Broda , Veterinarian Assistant

Sarah and her husband moved to Charlotte in the the fall of 2007. A month later she joined the Mixed Pet team starting at the South End location. After moving in their new house on the south side of Charlotte, she now calls the Stonecrest location her "home base".

Sarah comes from a rather large family originating from Michigan. She is the youngest of 7 children with 5 sisters and 1 brother and lots of nieces and nephews. Although she has no human children of her own, her husband and her have 3 furry children at home. She has a 4 year old dog named Lucky, who is a male papillion mix and is the love of her life. Lucky, however, was probably not the best name for him, as he has many medical problems and is very unlucky but Sarah wouldn't trade him for the world. She also has 2 cats. Honeybun, a short haired female calico at 3 years old, who she calls her "princess". Honeybun is one of the most pampered cats who you can often find her laying on top of her mom! Peanut who is the baby of the family is a male long haired orange and white cat who is almost 2. Peanut decided to adopt the von Broda household when he was 12 weeks old, and has been a part of the family since! Most of the time you can see him and Lucky wrestling around the house as they are best friends! Sarah also has had a painter turtle for the last 4 years that her oldest nephew gave her. She named him Mini Steve II after her first painter turtle that ran away, but she recently found out it's a girl turtle!

In her free time Sarah enjoys being outside with her animals and soaking up the sun! She finds herself being very fortunate to be able to make a difference in animals lives (and their humans!) everyday! She finds her job very rewarding and satisfying.

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Reception Team

Ashley Gragg , Client Relations Coordinator

She is a Charlotte native (one of the few!). Ashley has a wonderful husband, Rick and a 15 year old stepson, Corey. With her family living in Charlotte they spend a lot of time together going to Panther games and tailgating. She loves summer and the pool (thus her infamous tan). She has been playing the piano since the young age of ten, although we don't think that she needs to practice as she is quite accomplished! She LOVES Duke basketball and Florida football. Go gators!

Ashley has five pets (not including her husband). Mandy is her big-boned, beautiful golden retriever. Macie is her supermodel chinese hairless (which has hair, but don't ask). Murphy and Mittie are her favorite long haired felines and last but not least Marley is the baby and is her perfect goldendoodle (he's a "Parley", he is).

She loves working with clients! The pets get all of the attention as they should, so she enjoys spoiling the clients and making them smile.

She too feels like our entire staff has a fabulous sense of humor. There is not a day that goes by that we all don't have a really good laugh (never at Ashley's expense - of course).

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Tonya Grandy Sienkiewicz , Receptionist

Tonya was born in Biloxi Mississippi and has lived in many places all over the world including Canada, Germany and Saudi Arabia. She started moving at 6 months of age while her father was in the Air Force. Since then she has had the “itch” to move around and travel as much as possible. (She has visited almost ¾ of the United States!) In 2004, she moved back to Charlotte where she met her husband Jerry whom she married on April Fools Day!!

Some of Tonya’s favorite activities include hanging out with friends and going to the sporting events. She is a HUGE sports fan! This keeps her busy year round (and usually disappointed also). Tonya is also a certified scuba diver and her dream would be to own a dive shop on an island!

Tonya has six furry children.

Juneau is a Siberian Husky Mix. She was rescued from an animal shelter in Sparta, North Carolina 4 days before she was to be euthanized. She had never met Juneau, only had seen pictures on the internet. She raced to the mountains and adopted her. This was the best decision for both of them. They changed each other’s lives.

Scarlett is a German Shepherd Mix. She also was a rescue. Tonya decided to foster her for a week and she never left. Scarlett is also one of the most expensive FREE dogs ever!

She also has 4 crazy cats. Max, a black domestic shorthair and Rocky, a black and white domestic shorthair, were Tonya’s husband’s before they met. Abby and Hemingway, both domestic shorthairs, were rescues.

Tonya enjoys coming to work everyday and loves the patients, clients and employees at each clinic. Every day is an adventure!! “Her girls” at the South End clinic have become some of her closest friends. They make her laugh on a daily basis!

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Jamie Wollen , Receptionist

Born and raised in Greenville, SC. She started working at a vet hospital in 2001, a few years later her son was born in 2004, they moved to Waxhaw, NC late in 2008 and then started to work at the Stonecrest location in early 2009. She enjoys time with her boyfriend Tim and her son Payton.

She has two pets - Muddy, a domestic long hair (DLH) - torti, who is a bit antisocial and is obsessed with hair. Tippy on the other hand is a tan,daschihuahua that is always happy and likes to tap dance!! Tippy cannot live without CET chews.

Her favorite part about working at the clinic is the doctors and staff and the dynamics between us all. Working next to Chic-fil-a and Starbucks is a plus!

Everyday, Jamie enjoys the zany staff, clients and patients. Something happens daily that makes her almost fall out of her seat with laughter.