Hi all, I graduated 8 years ago with a BA in studio art... I've run a small farm since then, and am now revisiting the childhood dream of vet school. Am I crazy? What are my chances of successfully getting into a program, assuming I complete necessary prereq courses and get some clinical experience? How uncommon is it for older folks to enter vet programs? (I am 30, I would probably be 32 or 33 by the time I started school.) Is this a disadvantage for my application, or possibly an advantage? Any thoughts from folks in a similar situation would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
30?! HA! You're still a kid! Well, it's all relative, I guess. I'm sure you don't *feel* young compared to all the 22 year olds who are pursuing this, but hey, I'm stinkin' 42 here, so to me you're still way young.
Only you can decide if this is worth it for you, and with how uncertain you sound, I'd advise you not to commit yourself without getting some serious experience to help decide if being a vet is really right for you. I bet 99% of us had the "childhood dream," but obviously that alone in no way qualifies any of us. You gotta get through some hardcore science classes before even being considered (and then the REAL hardcore science classes begin, for 4 solid years!), you gotta make incredible sacrifices of time, money, personal life, etc. Not for the faint of heart.
The BA in studio art won't help, and I'm guessing you took little or none as far as hard sciences? So I'd say you've got a lot of ground to cover to "prove yourself" before you could be seriously considered. But, like I said, you're still young. If you did decide to go for it, you could spend 2-3 years doing pre-reqs and getting experience, apply (maybe a couple times), start vet school by mid-30's, and be done before you're 40. Some people would call that crazy, but hey, I guess I'm even crazier - if I get accepted this time, I would be graduating at 46. Not many people are game for starting over at the bottom of a new profession at that age. But the way I look at it, this is what I love. I'm gonna be 46 (or 50 or whatever) someday, might as well be doing something I love. And I figure I could still have a decent 20 year career, so to me, it's worth it. And hey, isn't 40 the new 30 or something?
But you should really think about what you want to do with the rest of your life, too. Do you want family, kids, travel, buying a home, a nice cushy retirement? Starting this journey late can seriously hamper all those things, as becoming a vet can easily suck up the next 10 years of your life, and that's before you even start working as a vet and making any money. Not that those other things are impossible - certainly there are many examples of amazing people who somehow manage to "have it all." But it's got to be a LOT harder. Myself, I'm childfree and staying that way, so in some respects I can "do whatever I want." I'll have some moderate inheritance some day, which will hopefully allow me to pay off the massive loans I will need to do this and maybe tuck some away for a retirement so I don't actually have to work until the day I die. But seriously think about your own personal/financial/relationship circumstances and decide just how bad you want this.
I think it is uncommon for people to pursue this past 30, but many do it. If you look at age ranges of most starting classes, they are usually like "22-40ish" with a mean of about 24. I've heard of people even starting school in their 50's. As far as advantage vs. disadvantage, it depends. I've had school reps tell me both. On the one hand, yes, I think anything over 30 raises eyebrows. On the other hand, schools do claim to want more diversity - a class of all 23 years olds would be pretty scary. Maturity, responsibility, life experience are all great things in a vet, and an older person *should* have an edge over the youngsters there.
And I think a lot depends on what you've done with your life prior. You're going to have to explain why you are so late to the game, but that explaining can give you a great chance to rise above all the 23 year olds. If you farted around, traveled, worked a series of dead-end jobs and suddenly now at 30 or whatever decide you want to be a vet, good luck. But like in my case, I've had a serious stable successful career before this. I've got my BA in psych, completed an MBA, earned my pilot's license, worked my way up in my field. I haven't been wasting my time, and I've got my isht together. But when it comes to applications, I think I've had to prove myself more, that I am really serious and not just going through a midlife crisis, and that has something to do with why I didn't get in my first time. I had to give up my well-paying former career, take an entry level assistant job in an ER, accumulate thousands of hours clinical experience (plus thousands of hours volunteer shelter experience), all while completing some pretty difficult pre-reqs.
I'd say your first steps should be getting yourself hooked up with a couple vets to get experience, either as a volunteer shadowing thing or maybe a part-time paid assistant, whatever you can do. You've got to see what they do to see if it's even worth considering further. If it is, start taking the basic pre-reqs you'll need, probably some lower level bio classes with labs. Those classes are not really too hard, but can start to give you a feel if you can handle the sciences and getting back into school.
Sorry for the ramble. But bottomline is you shouldn't be deterred just by your age. You can certainly still do this, IF you want it bad enough. Are you crazy enough to want it that bad?
