does it end up saying which track you did on your diploma?
Nope, not to my knowledge. They tell us that many people end up doing something entirely different than what they track, so if you feel, in the middle of fourth year, that you have "chosen the wrong track" - it isn't a big deal at all, you are still perfectly well equipped to do anything.
Are there certain rotations/experiences only open to people in a particular track?
There are some track classes that have enrollment caps on them. In terms of fourth year clerkships, I really don't know - that would be a good question for the adcoms!
Can you explain more about what the Public/Corporate track is? I'm very interested in infectious diseases/biodefense/public health, but I'm particularly interested in the food animal medicine application of it. Would there be a way to get both the public health side of things with a heavy food animal focus?
Public corporate is basically everything from infectious disease, research, exotics, international vetmed, wildlife, food safety, legislature, biodefense and public health, USDA stuff, herd health management (if you're into that, we have SO many great large animal faculty. Dee Whittier runs a Bovine Repro Symposium every other year that is great. He is a fun guy! Dr's Swecker, Pleasant, and Thatcher are all really nice too - Swecker especially, he cracks me up) and everything in between.
If that's what you wanted to do, I'd say track Food Animal track and take PC tracks as electives, or take PC-related free elective (or the other way around, track PC and take FA related electives and try to sneak in some of their track courses as electives for you, which you can probly do because they do not get too full). Have you seen our little course catalog thingie? It has a pretty good list of electives and things on it. It's on the website. Again I would ask adcoms for their input to - they are really pushing their P/C track. There are only maybe 8-10 PCers in my class of 90. Boo hoo! We are lonely!
One of the best things about the PC track is that we have so much freedom fourth years. Instead of having a bunch of rotations we have to choose from, we have a lot of "independent study" or "research" rotations, where basically you can pick whatever you want to do, wherever you wan tto do it. Want to go work for the USDA for a few weeks? Great. Want to work in a lab for a few weeks? Sure. Want to do more field LA work? Go for it. We still have to take the core rotations, however.
My and my friends usually come in between classes to say hi and chat with the people waiting for interviews when they come...if you are interviewing on the hour (like 10, 11, or so) we will probly see ya. The first years and us (the 2nds, that is) are pooling some class funds to get you all cookies too - no stressful interview should be without cookies!
You're also more than welcome to sit in on class or two if you want. Just PM me and I'll double check it with the profs. We've done it before, should be fine. Thursday we have Virology, Clin-Path, CardioRespiratory Med, and Musculoskeletal.
