Out of the country vet schools

Veterinary Science Graduate Certificate from UofI
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shortnsweet said:
Hogwarts exists...It's Glasgow. Look at the pictures man. Our school colors even matched Gryffindor.
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I'm seriously bummed now, should've applied. Pictures look absolutely amazing!

Can I get there by wheeling at the brick wall at my local AZ Irish pub?
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wheelin2vetmed said:
I'm seriously bummed now, should've applied. Pictures look absolutely amazing!

Can I get there by wheeling at the brick wall at my local AZ Irish pub?
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Hahahaha. You can certainly try. If you end up with a migraine and some hefty bruises we will all know the truth: you're a thorough muggle!
 
shortnsweet said:
I have seen a very clear difference in my students who have had more time in clinics (2 yrs vs 1) and the ones who had more externship time.
Makes me appreciate my 38 weeks of EMS that much more.
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Externship time is crucial, IMO! The difference in not just skills but confidence and attitude is huge, especially if you do an extended externship of at least a month in one facility (we had a 2 month external placement as a minimum requirement, I did 3 months in addition to the scattered weeks during my final year).
 
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I recently talked to a vet who went to Universidad autonomous in Mexico, its fully accredited and tuition is donation based. She told me that the minimum donation was 25 cents a semester!!!! I don't know if I would be willing to go that far but it would mean no debt.
 
SFsteph said:
I recently talked to a vet who went to Universidad autonomous in Mexico, its fully accredited and tuition is donation based. She told me that the minimum donation was 25 cents a semester!!!! I don't know if I would be willing to go that far but it would mean no debt.
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I could've sworn that I read somewhere that the total tuition for the entire duration of UNAM's veterinary course was closer to $1000, but I could be wrong. Still an absolute steal compared to US schools, at any rate. :prof:

I'd imagine that UNAM is easily the AVMA-accredited institution with the fewest amount of applications from Americans. You have to keep in mind that there is a major language barrier there. I actually considered applying to UNAM several times this cycle, but ultimately decided against it. I've studied Spanish for almost ten consecutive years. I've been abroad, both short- and long-term, to natively Spanish-speaking countries (Costa Rica, Mexico). Heck, I took a placement test before entering at a university that actually allowed me to place into 400-level Spanish courses as a freshman (I don't recommend doing this, by the way... it did a number on my cum GPA and to this day I can't do a whole lot to fix it bar waste money and time to retake those classes). But I don't even think that I'm near proficient enough with the language to handle a tough, professional, medical curriculum down there. I still wonder if I could have even passed the entry exam, to be honest. I'd wager that very few US pre-vets would actually be able to stay afloat when not only do they have to deal with the massive amounts of information that is thrown at them at vet school but also have to learn it in an entirely different language. A lot of the terminology is fairly similar, yes, but it is just one more hurdle to deal with while you're already stressed up to your eyeballs. :drowning:

Don't get me wrong, I think UNAM could be a decent money-saving option for those who are either very fluent in or native speakers of Spanish, but that doesn't apply to many pre-vets in the US, for sure. Many people seem to have a poor perception of Mexico itself, too (thanks, media!), but as someone who has been there herself, I can say it's a perfectly fine country once you acclimate to it. That's something you'll just have to deal with when you're moving abroad, regardless of where specifically that is.
 
ketoone said:
proficient enough with the language to handle a tough, professional, medical curriculum down there. I still wonder if I could have even passed the entry exam, to be honest. I'd wager that very few US pre-vets would actually be able to stay afloat when not only do they have to deal with the massive amounts of information that is thrown at them at vet school but also have to learn it in an entirely different language. A lot of the terminology is fairly similar, yes, but it is just one more hurdle to deal with while you're already stressed up to your eyeballs.
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Yes, I don't think any of the non-English (language) accredited schools will be of much interest to North American students, unless they are originally from those countries - France, Netherlands, Mexico - because the specific language needed for a professional school would be pretty daunting. There are plenty of English-language schools around the world that accredited for those who want an international experience while going to vet school.

(Rumour is the accreditation of UNAM was pushed more to make it easier for Mexican vets to work in the US than it was for US students to get a cheaper or easier place to go to vet school.)
 
Definitely thought Mexico City was a pretty dangerous place to live, so it's interesting to hear others say different. I never considered going since the only thing I can do with Spanish is read it (and my vocabulary has gotten way soft since I never read in Spanish either).
 
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dyachei said:
And pretty true
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I don't doubt the quality of education a Caribbean school can provide, but there are very few in academia who will agree with that statement
 
RedWall said:
\but there are very few in academia who will agree with that statement
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You are so far off on this statement.

Unless I am hearing exactly the opposite of what is actual coming out of the clinicians' mouths that I work with. Most of them have very, very positive things to say about the education that the Caribbean schools provide.
 
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not only at cornell! and I have no doubt Caribbean schools provide a positive experience for students, but it's a little absurd to say a top research institution provides the same quality of education as a Caribbean school. Both being AVMA accredited does not necessarily put them in the same league.
 
All of the Caribbean students I have worked with in clinics are just as well prepared as my classmates at MSU. I have been nothing but impressed with their knowledge, competency, and work ethic.

I have never heard a clinician compare a Carribean student to an MSU student. They really don't give a ****, tbh.
 
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RedWall said:
not only at cornell! and I have no doubt Caribbean schools provide a positive experience for students, but it's a little absurd to say a top research institution provides the same quality of education as a Caribbean school. Both being AVMA accredited does not necessarily put them in the same league.
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I don't think you understand what AVMA accreditation means. For a school to be AVMA accredited, it means they must teach the same material (though form can differ) and students must meet the same standards of all the other AVMA schools in order to graduate.

This isn't like with undergrad where there are tiers of schools (and even that doesn't necessarily mean much). An accredited vet school will get you the same quality of education as any other.
 
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Also, just because a school is a "top research university" doesn't make all their programs also "top."

You can have program A be highly regarded at a school, and have program B be rated behind many other "lesser" schools program of the same nature.

So saying a university is a "top research" school means nothing about their vet program.
 
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I think you might get different opportunities in certain areas at one school vs another but otherwise...the education itself I would definitely agree.
 
RedWall said:
not only at cornell! and I have no doubt Caribbean schools provide a positive experience for students, but it's a little absurd to say a top research institution provides the same quality of education as a Caribbean school. Both being AVMA accredited does not necessarily put them in the same league.
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It actually does. And unlike human medicine, the accredited Caribbean schools are well respected. Many students do very well and proceed to competitive internships and residencies. Cornell being a top research institution provides added benefit for those interested in research. Not necessarily for other students. Some of the top instructors/professors in their fields have taught at the Caribbean schools.
 
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Caiter92 said:
I don't think you understand what AVMA accreditation means. For a school to be AVMA accredited, it means they must teach the same material (though form can differ) and students must meet the same standards of all the other AVMA schools in order to graduate.

This isn't like with undergrad where there are tiers of schools (and even that doesn't necessarily mean much). An accredited vet school will get you the same quality of education as any other.
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Yes, but teaching the same material can be accomplished, as you said, in many forms, some more rigorous or innovative than others. Hmmm I'll look more into AVMA accreditation more carefully but it was to my understanding more of a checklist for veterinary schools to achieve.

And I'm aware different schools have different strengths in programs, but unfortunately Cornell's veterinary school is well known to be one of the world's top veterinary programs.

dyachei said:
It actually does
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And sorry that's based off of....? Popular opinion?

I really do respect Caribbean school graduates, I've worked with some myself in the past and they're excellent. However, I can also argue that the majority of Cornell's faculty and clinicians are leaders in their respective fields, and that the quality of the faculty corresponds to the quality of the education.
 
RedWall said:
Yes, but teaching the same material can be accomplished, as you said, in many forms, some more rigorous or innovative than others. Hmmm I'll look more into AVMA accreditation more carefully but it was to my understanding more of a checklist for veterinary schools to achieve.

And I'm aware different schools have different strengths in programs, but unfortunately Cornell's veterinary school is well known to be one of the world's top veterinary programs.


And sorry that's based off of....? Popular opinion?

I really do respect Caribbean school graduates, I've worked with some myself in the past and they're excellent. However, I can also argue that the majority of Cornell's faculty and clinicians are leaders in their respective fields, and that the quality of the faculty corresponds to the quality of the education.
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Dear lord, you're an arrogant one, aren't you?
 
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RedWall said:
However, I can also argue that the majority of Cornell's faculty and clinicians are leaders in their respective fields, and that the quality of the faculty corresponds to the quality of the education.
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You can argue all you want based on your imagination, but that doesn't make it true.

Yes, Cornell has many a leaders in their respective fields. They have quite a few big shots. they have an excellent research institution which does not compare to that of Carib. schools.

However, great clinicians do not make great teachers. Great researchers do not make great teachers esp in a clinical program. Anyone in vet school can tell you that. What you learn in the first three years of vet school really is kinda the same wherever you go. And the Caribbean schools do just as a fine job of teaching that material. The stuff you need to learn in a veterinary program is pretty standard.

And then these students go off to stateside schools for clinics... So as long as they start off on a level playing field in terms of their knowledge (which they do), their overall education really isn't that different at all from those of stateside schools.
 
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I thought pretty much everyone had agreed at this point that rankings, at least in terms of vet school, are basically meaningless...
 
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ketoone said:
I thought pretty much everyone had agreed at this point that rankings, at least in terms of vet school, are basically meaningless...
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This is pretty much how I feel about rankings and awards: "It's all a big jerk off."

 
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RedWall said:
Yes, but teaching the same material can be accomplished, as you said, in many forms, some more rigorous or innovative than others. Hmmm I'll look more into AVMA accreditation more carefully but it was to my understanding more of a checklist for veterinary schools to achieve.

And I'm aware different schools have different strengths in programs, but unfortunately Cornell's veterinary school is well known to be one of the world's top veterinary programs.


And sorry that's based off of....? Popular opinion?

I really do respect Caribbean school graduates, I've worked with some myself in the past and they're excellent. However, I can also argue that the majority of Cornell's faculty and clinicians are leaders in their respective fields, and that the quality of the faculty corresponds to the quality of the education.
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The quality of the faculty as clinicians or researchers does not always translate into their quality as teachers. One can be the best in the field of, say, epidemiology or virology, and still be lousy at teaching it to undergrad students......and as a result those student will learn less than they should about epidemiology or virology (for example). Seriously, I've heard a lot of respect for some non-US vet programs as being some of the best. But it's all conjecture and opinion, anyway. And no one will care where you got your degree from, they'll only care about whether you're licensed and what you know.
 
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dyachei said:
Vet school rankings mean next to nothing
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*U.S News & World rankings for veterinary schools mean next to nothing* is what I believe you meant to say.

Caiter92 said:
Dear lord, you're an arrogant one, aren't you?
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I'm sorry you feel that way when all I offered was a different opinion to the rest of you.

Minnerbelle said:
You can argue all you want based on your imagination, but that doesn't make it true.

Yes, Cornell has many a leaders in their respective fields. They have quite a few big shots. they have an excellent research institution which does not compare to that of Carib. schools.

However, great clinicians do not make great teachers. Great researchers do not make great teachers esp in a clinical program. Anyone in vet school can tell you that. What you learn in the first three years of vet school really is kinda the same wherever you go. And the Caribbean schools do just as a fine job of teaching that material. The stuff you need to learn in a veterinary program is pretty standard.

And then these students go off to stateside schools for clinics... So as long as they start off on a level playing field in terms of their knowledge (which they do), their overall education really isn't that different at all from those of stateside schools.
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Hmmmm okay I agree with this. I think I was thinking of opportunities rather than education, as @Caia pointed out.
 
I dunno. I'm not quite ready to hop on the "all vet schools provide the same education" bandwagon.

My personal experience as a student was that the island kids were no better or worse than any of us ... as a broad generalization.

But the evidence-based person in me would argue that none of us are doing much more than reflecting a politically correct sentiment that all schools are equal, or a desire to wish they were all equal, or .... well, something along those lines. The only way to really know for sure would be to track outcomes/placement of students coming out of those schools. "I know several people who went to Ross who got into highly competitive residencies" isn't much in the way of evidence. You'd need to drill down much more than anecdotal evidence.

I feel like the whole "AVMA accreditation" argument is a red herring. The accreditation standards are minimums. It doesn't mean that every vet school meeting them is equal - it just means that every vet school meeting them meets AT LEAST that lowest-acceptable standard. It doesn't mean one can't do a much better job of training than another just because they're both accredited.

I also reject the "a great research institution will be a better teaching institution" argument. I think that's an irrational argument. A great research institution probably/may/might produce better researchers, but better clinicians? Why would that inherently be true? Makes no sense. Good researchers aren't inherently better teachers. And good research institutions don't necessarily have the best learning cases for real-world clinicians.

I dunno. My personal perception is that there isn't much difference between students from Cornell and UCDavis and the other historically highly-ranked schools and students from the 'lower' tier schools or students from island schools.

But I think intellectual honesty demands recognizing that nobody in this discussion has produced any real evidence one way OR the other.
 
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LetItSnow said:
But the evidence-based person in me would argue that none of us are doing much more than reflecting a politically correct sentiment that all schools are equal, or a desire to wish they were all equal, or .... well, something along those lines. The only way to really know for sure would be to track outcomes/placement of students coming out of those schools.
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Is there a group anywhere that actually does this to anyone's knowledge?
 
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batsenecal said:
Is there a group anywhere that actually does this to anyone's knowledge?
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No, not really. And the data would be ... hard to interpret, at best. My real point is that all of this back 'n forth is just anecdotal evidence and really doesn't mean much one way or the other.
 
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LetItSnow said:
I feel like the whole "AVMA accreditation" argument is a red herring. The accreditation standards are minimums. It doesn't mean that every vet school meeting them is equal - it just means that every vet school meeting them meets AT LEAST that lowest-acceptable standard. It doesn't mean one can't do a much better job of training than another just because they're both accredited.
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Herring is so gross.
 
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LetItSnow said:
I dunno. I'm not quite ready to hop on the "all vet schools provide the same education" bandwagon........
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I don't think the issue is whether they provide the same education, but whether, on a broad base, they provide an equivalent education. No two (or more) will ever be the same.

And the other issue is whether or not there's any plausible way to actually rank veterinary programs or schools.....which there isn't. It's all opinion and conjecture based on imperfect methodology.

(And, yes, there are rankings other than the ridiculous-and-can-be-bought US News & World rankings which, by the way, don't assess any of the excellent programs outside of the US.)
 
CalliopeDVM said:
I don't think the issue is whether they provide the same education, but whether, on a broad base, they provide an equivalent education. No two (or more) will ever be the same.

And the other issue is whether or not there's any plausible way to actually rank veterinary programs or schools.....which there isn't. It's all opinion and conjecture based on imperfect methodology.

(And, yes, there are rankings other than the ridiculous-and-can-be-bought US News & World rankings which, by the way, don't assess any of the excellent programs outside of the US.)
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In the context of the discussion, it should have been obvious that by 'same' I meant 'equivalent' or 'one not being better than another'.

I would have thought it clear I didn't mean literally they were identical curricula.

My point was that people are arguing that this school produces better clinicians than that school ............ but nobody really KNOWS. Literally everything we have is either an irrelevant ranking using methodology that is laughable .... or limited anecdotal evidence.

We don't have any useful data.

I'm not one of those people that pulls the "we have no evidence" card out all the time for every argument. There's a place for experiential and anecdotal evidence. We all do it every day with cases we treat where we use some therapy over another because in our experience it's worked better. But in a case like this where it is literally one anecdotal argument back and forth after another ("The island kids I've known have sucked!" "Oh yeah? Well the ones I've known have been just great!") .... I think there's a place for saying "Ok. We really just don't know."
 
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RedWall said:
Yes, but teaching the same material can be accomplished, as you said, in many forms, some more rigorous or innovative than others. Hmmm I'll look more into AVMA accreditation more carefully but it was to my understanding more of a checklist for veterinary schools to achieve.

And I'm aware different schools have different strengths in programs, but unfortunately Cornell's veterinary school is well known to be one of the world's top veterinary programs.


And sorry that's based off of....? Popular opinion?

I really do respect Caribbean school graduates, I've worked with some myself in the past and they're excellent. However, I can also argue that the majority of Cornell's faculty and clinicians are leaders in their respective fields, and that the quality of the faculty corresponds to the quality of the education.
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It's not like there are 100's of veterinary schools. There's what, almost AVMA 50 accredited schools in the entire world? There are over 141 (Thanks Wikipedia) MD schools in this country alone. Not that a school couldn't be considered 'the best' just because it's part of a smaller pool..but when we know rankings aren't an accurate method to assess a school and the pool is that small, it means significantly less to me.

As for leaders in fields, I'm sure every school has a few big wigs walking around. Also, being board certified makes you a leader/expert in a field IMO, and teaching hospitals are loaded with boarded vets. At that point, it could just be teaching style that makes the difference, not whether or not one considers their professor to be the world's leading expert in the field.

That's all I have to say :p
 
pinkpuppy9 said:
As for leaders in fields, I'm sure every school has a few big wigs walking around. Also, being board certified makes you a leader/expert in a field IMO, and teaching hospitals are loaded with boarded vets. At that point, it could just be teaching style that makes the difference, not whether or not one considers their professor to be the world's leading expert in the field.
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I don't think this is true. There are definitely schools with better teaching hospitals/departments than others. There are definitely schools with better overall reputations for advancing vet med through their big wigs than others. Sure, most schools have things that they are strong in but that doesn't make them all equal. The cutting-edge-ness of all schools overall are not the same. Some are not at all "cutting edge." Like, some don't even have teaching hospitals and their research goals are just like enough to meet standards to be accredited... That's just not their mission (whether we agree that is okay or not is a different matter). I just don't think you can argue that students receive a better education because of it just due to the nature of the content that students need to know to graduate.
 
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pinkpuppy9 said:
It's not like there are 100's of veterinary schools. There's what, almost AVMA 50 accredited schools in the entire world? There are over 141 (Thanks Wikipedia) MD schools in this country alone. Not that a school couldn't be considered 'the best' just because it's part of a smaller pool..but when we know rankings aren't an accurate method to assess a school and the pool is that small, it means significantly less to me.
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I've been thinking about this "red herring" of accreditation. Accreditation is important to US/Canadian students who plan on returning to practice here (or residents there who hope to immigrate), but it is not the sole judge of quality. The fact that we know little about a vet school in Sweden, Japan, or Germany (for instance) doesn't mean that they may not have fabulous vet programs with great grads that put US grads to shame. We just don't know. Yes, more that we don't know.


(your post inspired me to count - 49 accredited schools in the world, out of over 500 vet schools worldwide)
 
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CalliopeDVM said:
I've been thinking about this "red herring" of accreditation. Accreditation is important to US/Canadian students who plan on returning to practice here (or residents there who hope to immigrate), but it is not the sole judge of quality. The fact that we know little about a vet school in Sweden, Japan, or Germany (for instance) doesn't mean that they may not have fabulous vet programs with great grads that put US grads to shame. We just don't know. Yes, more that we don't know.


(your post inspired me to count - 49 accredited schools in the world, out of over 500 vet schools worldwide)
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This is totally true. I was more just pointing out to the OP that to me, saying a school is the top school out of those 49 in the entire world means less to me than if it were 1/100s. And that's assuming the rankings were actually useful. Not that we need more schools, lol.
Minnerbelle said:
I don't think this is true. There are definitely schools with better teaching hospitals/departments than others. There are definitely schools with better overall reputations for advancing vet med through their big wigs than others. Sure, most schools have things that they are strong in but that doesn't make them all equal. The cutting-edge-ness of all schools overall are not the same. Some are not at all "cutting edge." Like, some don't even have teaching hospitals and their research goals are just like enough to meet standards to be accredited... That's just not their mission (whether we agree that is okay or not is a different matter). I just don't think you can argue that students receive a better education because of it just due to the nature of the content that students need to know to graduate.
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Maybe I'm unclear? I'm not trying to say that all teaching hospitals are the exact same or anything, I'm saying that I disagree with the OP saying that big wigs = better education. What is the difference between, for example, an equine clinician/practitioner teaching equine nutrition and someone who is board certified (a leader) in veterinary nutrition? Both presumably have a wealth of knowledge to share. When either comes in to teach the basic horse nutrition lecture, maybe they won't reuse the same lecture from past professors, and they will likely cover the same stuff since they'd be teaching the same students. At that point, it's how well the teacher gets his/her info across, and how well the students receive/learn it. It has nothing to do with being a big wig or not.

I learned significantly more from my undergrad genetics TA than the world-renowned professor, for example. It certainly won't always be the case, but it happens.
 
Not going to lie. My favorite part of the discussion was learning there are 49 AVMA schools and 500 schools world wide. Never knew that before.
 
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