WAMC: 1st time, traditional, high GPA, ok experience

[bluewaterbear]

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Hello, I'm excited to finally be posting after being a lurker!! I'm 21NB, just finished junior year, and am applying to Purdue (IS), NCSU, UC Davis, UF, Ohio State, and maybe WSU. Cost is a huge factor for me, so I can't afford to go to most OOS schools. I'm nervous because I spent time exploring careers in human medicine up until last year, so all of my vet hours and the majority of my animal hours are from last summer to now. I don't think the hours that I do have will help me stand out much, as they're mostly small animal GP and shelter volunteering. I also think I might just need to chill out haha. I've neglected LA hours quite a bit as I don't have much interest in it (respect to everyone who does; horses scare me.) I'm most interested in small animal emergency or exotics, and I'm very passionate about supporting low income and rural clients. I'm considering taking a gap year to save up money and get more experience, but I don't know if I would make enough for it to make much of a difference compared to potentially going to school next year. There are also a couple aspects of my application I don't know if I need to remove or change that I note below. My school does not have many resources for pre-vets (or pre-vet students in general), so I'm full of questions lol, especially since the schools I'm applying to are very competitive. Thank you so much, and I'm looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts!

All GPAs: 4.0

Major: Biology with Spanish minor

Veterinary Experience (by end of summer, 1055 total):
-225 hours as intern at small animal GP
-420 hours as vet assistant at same small animal GP
-136 hours as vet assistant in ER
-80 hours shadowing small animal GP
-130 hours shadowing exotics and wildlife
-60 hours shadowing equine
-4 hours shadowing ophthalmology (short, but was meaningful for me)

Animal Experience (by end of summer, 305 total):
-106 hours at wildlife rehab
-75 hours as dog walker at shelter 1
-104 hours as cat volunteer at shelter 2
-20 hours with farm animals (pigs and turkeys mostly)

Research Experience (by end of summer):
-1700 hours in animal behavior lab as paid lab assistant: 3rd author on published study, will be first author and (hopefully) publishing my own project next spring
-I've done about 350 hours of husbandry work (cleaning cages, feeding, etc.) for the lab animals that I've included here as they're part of my lab assistant responsibilities, and I got paid for them as a lab assistant. I'm wondering if it'd count as animal experience/if it'd benefit me to split the hours up.

Awards/scholarships:
-Dean's list 6 semesters
-Full ride scholarship
-German honors award from high school
-BLS certification
-Summa cum laude in high school (is this worth including?)

Extracurriculars:
-120 hours as secretary for LGBTQ+ students club
-195 hours as UTA for biochemistry
-75 hours as UTA for organic chemistry
-64 hours volunteering at food pantry
-48 hours volunteering to help make glasses as part of Remote Area Medical clinic
-15 hours volunteering at soup kitchen
-50 hours shadowing ER physician assistant
-10 hours shadowing bariatrics MD
-60 hours as pre-med club member
~1000 hours learning languages as a hobby (Spanish, ASL, German, Irish), have done this since middle school
~1000 hiking as a hobby since high school

I don't know if I should include my shadowing hours for human medicine, but I wanted to show what I was doing before last summer. I'm also unsure if I should include the pre-med club because it was just my freshman and sophomore years, but I got my now-expired phlebotomy certification from it, which was helpful for learning bloods draws in the clinic. The hours for the hobbies are just placeholders that I lowballed because I'm assuming admissions just want to see we have interests and exact hours don't matter a ton?

Employment:
-1500 hours as a cashier in high school

My letters of recommendation will be from my PI, DVM at the small animal GP I spent most time at, and the lead technician at that same clinic. I feel confident about the one from my PI, but I don't know how having two from the same clinic is received, and I haven't spent enough time elsewhere to feel good about a letter. I feel alright about my personal statement, and I would call myself an average writer.

 

[mw1356]

i think your stats look great! you have way more vet hours than i applied with, and i was pre-vet from the start. i would include your old human medicine experiences, especially if you plan to mention those at all in your essays. when i applied, i didn’t include any informal hobbies (as in, not in a club or team for them) and didn’t feel it hurt my application, but i know plenty of people do add them, and i think your language learning might be especially useful to highlight. for research, i think i included the husbandry i did under my research hours rather than animal hours, but i really think you could go either way and it probably wouldn’t make much of a difference.

if you really want a gap year to save up some money and enjoy a little bit of free time, absolutely go for it! however, i think your application would be pretty competitive now, and i’m not sure the extra hours you’d get during a gap year would make a huge difference. one thing i would recommend is trying to get a letter of rec from a professor that has taught you (maybe one you TAed for?) and/or your academic advisor. having 2 letters from the same clinic is probably fine, but you might want a little more diversity in your letters overall.

 

[kitzsuna]

With a 4.0 gpa I would add TAMU to your list, even though there are very limited OOS seats. It’s probably the most affordable or one of the most affordable for OOS if I recall correctly. They weigh gpa very heavily from what I understand

 

[battie]

I've neglected LA hours quite a bit as I don't have much interest in it (respect to everyone who does; horses scare me.)

I'm very passionate about supporting low income and rural clients.

If you're going to mention rural, you need to get some LA experience to show you mean it. Not necessarily farms with 200+ head herds, but folks with a hobby farm will absolutely fall in this category and may have more need tbh.

I don't know if I should include my shadowing hours for human medicine, but I wanted to show what I was doing before last summer. I'm also unsure if I should include the pre-med club because it was just my freshman and sophomore years

Absolutely. There's no reason not to. Be prepared to answer why vet med and not human med, though; especially with all the loan and industry changes happening now.

 

[dew5]

Seconding the likelihood of being asked "why veterinary medicine rather than human medicine". After working as a clinical laboratory scientist (human infectious disease department), this question came up in every single one of my interviews. It is worth including your human med hours though. Your experiences in the pre-med club, phlebotomy cert, and shadowing are valuable and may help you stand out from the crowd, so to speak.

Also echoing what others have said - your GPA will carry a lot of weight in the admissions process. I think you have strong odds at your IS school and potentially the places you are applying OOS, especially if you can draw upon meaningful experiences and support your desire to support low income/rural clients well in your essays and interviews.

I know you feel like you have a "mediocre" amount of experience hours, but there is variety here. If this cycle happens to not go your way (lets say you are left with an expensive OOS option), then you are in a very good position to reapply next cycle with more hours (consider LA) and aim for your IS/a more affordable OOS school (i.e. one that allows for residency change).

 

[bluewaterbear]

i think your stats look great! you have way more vet hours than i applied with, and i was pre-vet from the start. i would include your old human medicine experiences, especially if you plan to mention those at all in your essays. when i applied, i didn’t include any informal hobbies (as in, not in a club or team for them) and didn’t feel it hurt my application, but i know plenty of people do add them, and i think your language learning might be especially useful to highlight. for research, i think i included the husbandry i did under my research hours rather than animal hours, but i really think you could go either way and it probably wouldn’t make much of a difference.

if you really want a gap year to save up some money and enjoy a little bit of free time, absolutely go for it! however, i think your application would be pretty competitive now, and i’m not sure the extra hours you’d get during a gap year would make a huge difference. one thing i would recommend is trying to get a letter of rec from a professor that has taught you (maybe one you TAed for?) and/or your academic advisor. having 2 letters from the same clinic is probably fine, but you might want a little more diversity in your letters overall.

Thank you so much for the reply! This definitely clears up a lot of confusion for me!

 

[bluewaterbear]

If you're going to mention rural, you need to get some LA experience to show you mean it. Not necessarily farms with 200+ head herds, but folks with a hobby farm will absolutely fall in this category and may have more need tbh.



Absolutely. There's no reason not to. Be prepared to answer why vet med and not human med, though; especially with all the loan and industry changes happening now.

I'll definitely try to get more LA hours this summer! I'm expecting the "why vet med" questions as well, and I feel confident about answering it. I'm just hoping admissions committees don't ee the switch as fickle and worry that I might change my mind about vet med as well. Thank you!!

 

[bluewaterbear]

Seconding the likelihood of being asked "why veterinary medicine rather than human medicine". After working as a clinical laboratory scientist (human infectious disease department), this question came up in every single one of my interviews. It is worth including your human med hours though. Your experiences in the pre-med club, phlebotomy cert, and shadowing are valuable and may help you stand out from the crowd, so to speak.

Also echoing what others have said - your GPA will carry a lot of weight in the admissions process. I think you have strong odds at your IS school and potentially the places you are applying OOS, especially if you can draw upon meaningful experiences and support your desire to support low income/rural clients well in your essays and interviews.

I know you feel like you have a "mediocre" amount of experience hours, but there is variety here. If this cycle happens to not go your way (lets say you are left with an expensive OOS option), then you are in a very good position to reapply next cycle with more hours (consider LA) and aim for your IS/a more affordable OOS school (i.e. one that allows for residency change).

Thank you so much for the advice! Also, congrats on Auburn! Somehow I've met more vets that went to Auburn than from any other school (even Purdue), and they're all great vets and loved it there.