Equine practice- does it matter which school?

[mnb4nj]

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I have been super lucky and been admitted to VMCVM (my in-state school), the University of Edinburgh, University College Dublin, and the University of Florida. I have been talking with several different vets in equine, food animal, and small animal, and I am getting mixed reviews as to what is most important when choosing a school. Most people have said that cost should be my number one consideration. VMCVM, as my in-state option, so it would be the cheapest by far. Others who have worked in equine practice have said that equine vets/students coming out of VMCVM are noticeably weaker than students coming out of other schools. I have heard that VMCVM doesn't have the caseload to give equine track students much experience since not many horses go to the Blacksburg campus and the Leesburg hospital is so far away that students don't spend much time there. I have also heard that the hospital in Leesburg is not always kind to clients and students. I don't know how seriously I should take these opinions.
I would love to go abroad (Edinburgh would be my top choice, if money was no object). I like that the Dick Vet has an equine hospital on site with the school and they have opportunities for students to participate in cottage duty (looking after in-house equine patients) even as a younger student. I also like how the Dick Vet's faculty seem really involved with students and how students are encouraged to have a work-life balance. Other schools have similar appeal. Florida has proximity to Wellington and Ocala sport horse populations plus their equine hospital is right next to the vet school campus. UCD being the big vet school in Ireland would have the Irish sport horse population that I would get to work with. I want to be practical and not sink myself into even more debt for no reason, but I know horse people can be picky about who they have work for them. There is a very strong appeal of going out of state (or out-of-country) and having a better reputation to get equine internships/residencies (I want to do sports medicine and am considering a surgical residency) and future associate positions at a reputable, successful practice. Anyone have any advice on choosing a school? Thanks!

 

[battie]

Not at any of these schools, but I have been relatively active in my school's AAEP chapter through our equine emergency team and foal watch team. I'd say that we have a medium level caseload for equine for whatever perspective that adds. But the clinicians I've worked with here in equine don't seem to feel that any specific school will be outright detrimental for your career. This is mainly because the externships and stuff you do outside of class (foal watch, etc) make a difference. All our equine people who got internships this year did externships at other hospitals throughout their breaks and clinical year.

Basically, if you go looking for the opportunities to learn and excel in equine, it doesn't matter where you go.

 

[turnandburn]

Also consider back up plans... a lot of my colleagues wanted to go into equine and did for awhile, but ended up going into small animal / government/ other type practice.

 

[EngrSC]

I have been super lucky and been admitted to VMCVM (my in-state school), the University of Edinburgh, University College Dublin, and the University of Florida. I have been talking with several different vets in equine, food animal, and small animal, and I am getting mixed reviews as to what is most important when choosing a school. Most people have said that cost should be my number one consideration. VMCVM, as my in-state option, so it would be the cheapest by far. Others who have worked in equine practice have said that equine vets/students coming out of VMCVM are noticeably weaker than students coming out of other schools. I have heard that VMCVM doesn't have the caseload to give equine track students much experience since not many horses go to the Blacksburg campus and the Leesburg hospital is so far away that students don't spend much time there. I have also heard that the hospital in Leesburg is not always kind to clients and students. I don't know how seriously I should take these opinions.
I would love to go abroad (Edinburgh would be my top choice, if money was no object). I like that the Dick Vet has an equine hospital on site with the school and they have opportunities for students to participate in cottage duty (looking after in-house equine patients) even as a younger student. I also like how the Dick Vet's faculty seem really involved with students and how students are encouraged to have a work-life balance. Other schools have similar appeal. Florida has proximity to Wellington and Ocala sport horse populations plus their equine hospital is right next to the vet school campus. UCD being the big vet school in Ireland would have the Irish sport horse population that I would get to work with. I want to be practical and not sink myself into even more debt for no reason, but I know horse people can be picky about who they have work for them. There is a very strong appeal of going out of state (or out-of-country) and having a better reputation to get equine internships/residencies (I want to do sports medicine and am considering a surgical residency) and future associate positions at a reputable, successful practice. Anyone have any advice on choosing a school? Thanks!

I haven't been to the Leesburg campus but the rest of this is false. I work in the teaching hospital (we do have a large animal/equine hospital on site so I'm not sure where you heard that we don't??) and I would say that our equine case load is steady (though I haven't been at another school for comparison). The nice thing about tracking equine at VMCVM (I'm an equine tracker) is that the majority of students track small animal or mixed so we get a lot more individual attention and hands on opportunities in equine labs because the track has fewer students. I'm also on the board of our AAEP club and there are opportunities to be involved with equine field service in non-covid times (so hopefully this will resume next year). And many of our equine clinicians are so so so great 😍 We also have more blocks in our clinical year for externships than small animal/mixed trackers do.
But at the end of the day, going to a tracking vs non-tracking school really doesn't matter. Every vet student needs to know enough about all species to pass the NAVLE. I also want to point out that equine vets are typically paid less than small animal counterparts and graduating with substantial loans will make working in the equine industry that much harder.