Being a veterinarian is a lifelong dream for many. Animals are such an emotional part of so many lives when growing up, it’s natural that children want to get a job where they can help animals. For many, that seed is planted deep and grows, consuming their life’s direction and passion. For others, being a vet seems like a neat idea, just one of many possible professional paths. Your motivations for going to vet school don’t matter nearly so much as how content you will be with the decision. This is The Vetducator’s What You Should Know About Vet School Before you Apply.
- You will work extremely hard. If hard work and learning isn’t your thing, find a different path. Some students fail veterinary school. How is it possible, since we’re picking the top students? Simple: undergrad and even grad school do not prepare you for vet school. Some people can’t handle the time and intellectual pressure.
- When it comes to the social dynamics of vet school, vet school is high school. You will be with the same people all day, every day, for four years. Cliques form, relationships get made and destroyed, egos are built and crushed. If you think it’s some enlightened bastion of higher learning, think again. It’s not a reason not to go, but you should be prepared.
- It is incredibly expensive. Vet school, if you plan to be a general practice veterinarian, is not a good financial investment. Ask yourself if you could be happy doing something else. Your instinctive answer is “No! I have to be a vet to be happy!” I believe this is extremely naive. You don’t know what will make you happy until you get there. In fact, we have very good evidence that humans adapt amazingly well to their experience. Imagine losing your arm, or your sight- can you imagine yourself being as happy as if you had the arm or your sight? Probably not, but in studies people who experience some ‘adverse’ life changing event are just as happy as those who do not. Think long and hard about the return on investment. And absolutely do not go to a private school for vet school. Although some of them are fantastic, you will be so incredibly in debt your happiness will be reduced because of it. If you can’t get in to your state school, find a different career.
- You may not have a job. Before 2008, it was believed veterinary medicine is recession proof. Well, the global financial collapse proved that to be wrong. I remember many years when new graduates did not have jobs by graduation. Veterinary schools are admitting more students, and more veterinary schools are popping up all the time. The market will be flooded again and, if that aligns with an economic downturn when you graduate, what will you do? Particularly if you are deeply in debt from going to a private school?
I am tempted to end on some warm-hearted, encouraging note, but I have to be honest with you. Veterinarians have a high rate of suicide. We work long hours and clients scream at us for being money-grubbers who don’t care about their pets. Serious injury from being bitten or kicked is not uncommon. You can certainly make a good life being a veterinarian, but you can also make a good life doing a lot of other things. Academic veterinary medicine has been good to me, but I think I could have been just as happy doing, say, biochemistry. Maybe you could be, too.