{"id":443,"date":"2015-06-12T15:44:50","date_gmt":"2015-06-12T15:44:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/?p=443"},"modified":"2015-06-18T19:26:43","modified_gmt":"2015-06-18T19:26:43","slug":"what-is-vet-college-really-like","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/2015\/06\/12\/what-is-vet-college-really-like\/","title":{"rendered":"What is Vet College Really Like?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Kelsey\"<\/a>Take a look inside the OSU College of\u00a0 Veterinary Medicine with student Kelsey Scanlan.<\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

Every year, the OSU College of Veterinary Medicine receives over 800 applications for fifty-six open slots in the Doctor of Veterinary Medicine program. That means our students are the best and the brightest: They are selected not just for their grades and test scores, but also for their passion and dedication to the veterinary profession. Kelsey Scanlan is one of those students.<\/p>\n

In her third year at OSU, Scanlan is still excited about veterinary medicine despite the hard work, long hours, and overwhelming cost of her education.<\/p>\n

On a non-test day, Scanlan arrives at Magruder Hall for her first class at eight in the morning.\u00a0 \u201cIf it is a test day, I usually show up between five a.m. and six a.m.,\u201d she says. As a third-year student, she is also assigned patients to monitor. \u201cI may have to go in at 7 a.m. to check on a patient, and if I have surgery that day, I\u2019ll be here until 7 p.m. or later,\u201d she says. Then she still needs to study.<\/p>\n

Around Magruder, you\u2019ll often see a T-shirt that states: \u2018Real doctors treat more than one species.\u2019 Human doctors may argue that point, but certainly it is true that veterinary students are required to memorize a massive and diverse amount of information: The cranial tibial muscle is superficial in a dog, but deep in a large animal; some animals get antibodies from their mother through the placenta, others get it from mother\u2019s milk; the same drug can work differently in dogs than in cats; and so on. Veterinary students get tested on all of it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI came in from undergrad thinking, \u2018I\u2019m going to do fine because I know how to study, but this is a whole new ball game,\u201d says Scanlan. \u201cBy the second week, when I had a stack of 400 flash cards, I knew this wasn\u2019t going to work,\u201d she laughs.<\/p>\n

Now Scanlan studies with her good friend Kelsey Anderson. \u201cWe go through our outlines, then quiz each other on important points. We like to sit in coffee shops around town; I like to hear the music and laughter . . . it\u2019s nice to know that life is going on around us.\u201d That is important when you spend all day in classes and labs, study until ten or eleven every night, then study some more on Saturday and Sunday.<\/p>\n

But Scanlan is not complaining; far from it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s amazing,\u201d she says. \u201cIt can be stressful, so sometimes you forget how lucky we are to be here. It sounds corny, but every day when I walk into this building, I know that the stress is good because it means I am in a graduate program where I get to help people and animals in a job that millions of people would love to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Scanlan recently completed one of her favorite electives: Cardiology. \u201cEach professor likes to sell their favorite subject so they say things like, \u2018The liver! You can\u2019t live without it!\u201d she laughs. \u201cDr. Sisson hooked me with, \u2018You can live if your brain starts to shut down, but if your heart shuts down, nothing will work.\u2019 It is incredible: the heart has its own mind; its own electrical system. I love it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like most students, Scanlan has found Small Animal Surgery to be the hardest class so far. \u201cIt was one of my favorites, but it was also the hardest.\u00a0 It came at the start of third year, when I was just getting my foot in the door doing clinical work, and there I am, actually helping with surgeries. It was so overwhelming:\u00a0 all the intricate details and knowing that a life is dependent on it.\u201d<\/p>\n

For those reasons, the class also requires a lot of study time. \u201cIt was overwhelming but exciting. The professors, like Dr. Milovancev, the skill he has in soft tissue surgery . . .\u00a0 I would leave with my mouth hanging open.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unlike many college students, veterinary students rarely take the whole summer off to bask in the sun. They either have internships, externships, or work as volunteers for animal welfare organizations. Scanlan is no exception. She spent last summer on an externship at the Oregon National Primate Center. \u201cThat was incredible medicine,\u201d she says. \u201cI learned so much, and got so much hands-on experience.<\/p>\n

On top of all the hard work, veterinary students face the worrisome burden of school debt. In the U.S., the average veterinary student graduates with $148,000 in loans. Thanks to scores of generous supporters, a small portion of that debt is alleviated by scholarship money. Every student at the OSU College of Veterinary Medicine gets financial assistance through scholarships.<\/p>\n

As a student on the Dean\u2019s List, Scanlan has received several scholarships, but one of the most meaningful to her has been the Otto and Helga Spring award. When she wrote a thank-you note to Helga Spring and they met for coffee, the two women discovered many common interests. \u201cWe were going to just meet for an hour, but we ended up talking for three hours. She is an incredible lady,\u201d says Scanlan. \u201cShe loves alternative medicine \u2013 acupuncture and Chinese medicine.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scanlan is active in several student organizations, including the Integrative Medicine Club, who paid for her to attend the American Holistic Veterinary Medicine Conference in Portland. She asked Spring to go with her and they spent the whole day attending workshops on topics like acupuncture, physical therapy, chiropractics, and nutrition. \u201cShe loves animals and people so it was fun spending the day with her, learning together,\u201d says Scanlan.<\/p>\n

Because Scanlan relies on scholarship money to help pay the bills, she knows how important it is to reach out to potential donors so future students will have the same benefit.\u00a0 \u201cI feel so lucky that I got [scholarship money] because the cost of school freaks me out!\u201d she says. \u201cI delayed coming to vet school because I was trying to work and save.\u00a0 I was thinking, \u2018Oh my gosh, how can I do this?\u2019 Every little bit has been an enormous help; it makes me teary-eyed because it is so, so helpful.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Take a look inside the OSU College of\u00a0 Veterinary Medicine with student Kelsey Scanlan.   Every year, the OSU College of Veterinary Medicine receives over 800 applications for fifty-six open slots in the Doctor of Veterinary Medicine program. That means our students are the best and the brightest: They are selected not just for their… Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1802,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3FFxI-79","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1802"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=443"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":449,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443\/revisions\/449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.blogs.oregonstate.edu\/animalconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}