Three graduates entering veterinarian school this fall

Three recent CSC graduates have met that challenge head on, and recently earned entrance to veterinary medicine schools for the fall 2016 semester, even though Chadron State doesn’t offer a major tailored to that career path.

That hasn’t deterred many students, though, as 43 CSC graduates have been accepted into veterinary schools since 1987.

The most recent CSC graduates, Amber Christianson and Dallas Shaw, will begin classes at Washington State University’s veterinary school this fall, while Brittany Senecal will attend Illinois State.

Christianson, a December 2015 graduate, and Shaw, who completed her undergraduate degree in May, are both from Wyoming. Senecal, who graduated in 2014 and is currently assistant director of housing and residence life at CSC, is from Colorado.

Only 28 schools in the U.S. offer four-year veterinary medicine degrees and the small number of spaces at each school are among the reasons that the entrance process is so selective, according to Madison.

“They say they only require a 3.0 (grade point average), but if you look at who they accept the average is 3.6,” she said.

Another challenge for pre-vet students is keeping track of the prerequisite courses at the different schools, because they aren’t standardized, Madison said.

“Veterinary schools don’t have a general core of prerequisites,” said Madison, who keeps a spreadsheet to help students track the requirements for the schools they hope to attend.

While CSC offers courses needed to gain entry into most vet schools, completing them all within four years can be a challenge, because there isn’t a pre-vet major, according to Madison.

“We don’t have a single path,” she said. “They take a major in the science department because those courses match the prerequisites. It’s similar to pre-med but they don’t take human anatomy.”

That does offer some flexibility, however, as students can put together a degree to match their interests, Madison said.

“They can put things in that make sense for their career path. They can take mammalogy,” she said. “They can take ornithology. We have all sorts of courses that the typical biology degree doesn’t.”

Another challenge is the requirement that applicants have 1,000 hours of job shadowing with a veterinarian and students must submit applications to vet schools during their junior year.

 All of those hurdles didn’t deter Senecal from pursuing the goal she has had since childhood of becoming a veterinarian. Senecal’s parents are second generation pet store owners, so she grew up working with animals, and knowing that vet care is a big part of store overhead. The combination of working multiple jobs to pay for college, and a tough chemistry class almost derailed her plans, but Senecal persisted, and earned a biology degree in 2014. To complete the job shadowing hours, she took an internship with a dental veterinary specialist in Colorado.

Concerned that her GPA wasn’t high enough, she also enrolled in classes at Metro State College in Denver, an experience that gave some insight into the strength of the CSC programs, she said.

“Their (Metro State’s) classes were infinitely easier than (CSC’s), Senecal said. “It’s rough here but if you get through it, and you get in, you are prepared.”

With prerequisites completed, Senecal applied to five vet schools, and made the waiting list for one. She applied again the next year and again was put on the waiting list. In her third round of applications, she gained admission to the vet school at the University of Illinois and is ready to begin the program there in a few months. Undecided on a specialty at present, Senecal is thinking about critical care or canine reproduction. “What I’d want to do is work at pet stores and make sure the sires and dams are healthy,” she said.

Shaw’s path to vet school also wasn’t direct. She had a basketball scholarship to attend CSC and entered as a criminal justice major. Shaw switched to a biology degree, with a pre-vet minor in her second year, motivated in part by her family’s ranching background.

“I’ve always been around animals,” she said.

The rigorous science background needed for vet school entrance led Shaw to drop basketball in her final year at CSC.

“You have to dedicate a lot of time (to coursework),” she said. “That’s why I didn’t play my senior year.”

Shaw also applied to several vet schools and was accepted at Washington State. Wyoming residents can attend there at resident tuition rates, which will help with the cost of school, said Shaw, who plans to return to Wyoming and work with large animals after completing her degree.

Chadron State’s pre-vet curriculum provided a strong background for vet school, according to Shaw. She also said working with Chadron veterinarian Dr. Lynn Steadman was valuable preparation for her career.

Taking an active role in CSC’s pre-vet club is a good way to gain insight into the application process, Madison said. On a visit to the vet school at Colorado State this year, club members were able to have direct discussions with admissions representatives. Club members also attend a national conference of pre-vet majors where they can visit with representatives from many different vet schools.

Madison said she tries to make contact with students interested in vet school during their first year at CSC, so she can help them take courses that meet the prerequisites of the schools they want to attend.

“I help them navigate the requirements for the schools,” she said.

Once CSC students are accepted to a vet school, they are well prepared for the four years of additional training, and the demanding, science-oriented classes that it will take to become a veterinarian, according to Madison.

“We have really good courses that give the students a good foundation,” she said.

That’s part of the success CSC students have had in veterinary medicine for many years said long-time faculty member Joyce Hardy.

“We have had a strong and proud tradition of successfully preparing students for veterinary medicine professional school, going back as long as I can remember,” Hardy said.