Good News For Connecticut Residents

[nhsvs]

Connecticut finally is no longer among the very few states without a vet school that has no contracts for its residents. As of this year, Connecticut is now contracting with Iowa State. It's a slow start, with funding available for five seats, but it's better than nothing. Let's hope that they expand the program. At one point, there was some talk about starting a vet school at UConn, but I guess that idea has been tabled because of the expense.

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[twelvetigers]

That's too bad, a 29th vet school would have been nice!

Congrats to Connecticut residents! I can't imagine ONLY having OOS options. Let all of us ISers be thankful to be from a state with a vet school... if we can get in, that is!!

 

[Moonpaw]

That's great for CT residents! I too couldn't imagine not having an IS option. Not that mine accepted me, but still...not having that option would have been even scarier.

It seems kind of random, though, that CT chose Iowa to contract with. Not that they all do, but don't most states tend to contract with schools that are closer?

 

[twelvetigers]

That's actually not *that* far... I think NJ still has a contract with OKSU... my guess is that distance isn't a factor. That, and a lot of the schools in the New England states are bigger ones that don't need (or necessarily want) contract states. Tufts is a private school, so thy aren't interested either. Considering that, Iowa seems a little closer. At least compared to CSU or the like.

 

[Sapphir3blu3]

Congrats, Connecticut folk, and go you Huskies

NJ does have has, at last count, 2 seats in OK. The others are 4 at Tufts and 2 at Tuskeegee. Previously there were others---a handful each at Penn, Cornell, Illinois, and Iowa---but all those schools fired NJ when budget cuts meant the state could no longer pay for those seats. Remains to be seen whether NJ will even be able to hang on to the lousy 8 seats it has now. It's pretty grim.

But anyway, the geography of both those lists is pretty random. I don't know how contract relationships are determined but proximity would seem to have nothing to do with it.

 

[JerseyLynn]

According to our state university website, NJ didn't need a vet school with all the expenses because they had over 50 seats guaranteed to them each year. With the budget cuts, things are pretty tough right now for applicants. This is a very populated state competing for some 8 seats. Imagine the demand for grads in this state, but in the meantime, it is a killer not having an instate school, and even the NJ Dept. of Agriculture keeps asking for at least more seats to be funded. I don't get it, but it doesn't look too good right now. (I'm starting to understand why so many NJ students go a couple of cycles, or even out of the country)
By the way, N.J. has a lot of great vets that have graduated from Iowa, since we were guaranteed up to 20 seats a year in the past. It's a great school, and like you said, 5 seats are a start!

 

[winglessflight]

It seems kind of random, though, that CT chose Iowa to contract with. Not that they all do, but don't most states tend to contract with schools that are closer?

I got one of the contract seats (yay!), it was officially voted in in November. However, only the first year is approved, so money off the other three have not been approved yet. The reason that CT chose Iowa was that they were willing to give us the most money off tuition for what we were offering monetarily. For example, there are five spots of $20,000 a spot. Iowa was willing to take almost all of the money we were offering them and use it to reduce our tuition. Other closer schools wanted to keep some of the money for themselves, so there either would have been less seats, or less money per seat. Also, Iowa was the most up front about their strengths and weaknesses, and was very receptive to the idea of the contract. They were also nice enough to extend the VMCA's deadline for CT students that hadn't originally applied to them, since the contract was made after the deadline.

Its very exciting that CT finally made a contract. They have been talking about putting in a vet school at UConn for the past 30 years, as there is the land available, as well as the animals. Vet school is also the only major professional school that CT lacks (theres dental, med, law, nursing, etc). However, I doubt they will put one in anytime soon, so the contract is the best we have at least

 

[nhsvs]

^My understanding is that at some point Connecticut was also trying to negotiate a contract with Kansas State. Does anyone know if that has been abandoned in favor of the contract with Iowa State or is Connecticut eventually looking to contract with more than one school? I can't imagine that five spots per class is going to fill the void in Connecticut for vets, particularly with existing vets retiring and the difficulty in getting non-resident vet school graduates to move to Connecticut due to its high cost of living.

 

[purplebunnie]

Hooray for Ohio State and allowing a residency change

Yeah I loved the email asking me if I wanted to forward my registration materials for an additional 100 once I was completely broke from the six schools I already sent materials to.

Isn't there a ridiculous "laptop fee" of like $2000 required for the CT contract students? I read that in the email, but it wasn't very specific. For that much, it better be a Macbook or make waffles.