1. Not everyone going into vet med will be working in a clinical setting.
2. Technician skills are umm, well, as stated, technician skills. We keep talking about the lack of vets, staff, etc in the industry, we need to utilize our technicians to do the work they are trained to do. Veterinarians should RARELY need to be doing any sort of technician skills, that isn't their job. They shouldn't be anywhere near as good at those things as a vet tech. Just like you don't want your emergency room MD placing your IV catheter, you shouldn't be looking for the veterinarian to set the IV catheter either.
3. Experience isn't necessarily about the skills, it is about learning about the industry and if you can really see yourself working in the industry. While yes, it sucks that GPA matters so much, but if someone has shown (through GPA) that they aren't keeping up well with intense, involved science courses, what makes you think they could keep up in vet school with more intense and more involved science courses. Veterinary medicine is about understanding the actual medicine and science so you can diagnose, do surgery and prescibe (at least in the clinical setting). It isn't about how well you can place an IV catheter or draw blood--- that isn't a veterinarian's job.
My coworker has done a ton of dental CE and discussed her case with a specialist who was basically like "oh, yeah, that's a malinois thing."
