Ten Unconventional Tips for Pre-Vet Students

Anyone can tell you that getting into veterinary school means getting experience with animals, getting good grades in science, and creating good relationships with employers and potential letter-of-rec writers. But there are some pro tips that many people don't think to share, or don't realize until they're older. Here, I give you ten tips that are best heard as early in your life as possible, not only to help you get in to veterinary school, but to help you reach any goal you want in life.

Note: this article is an adaptation of a handout I passed out during a speaking gig at the UC Davis Vet Aide Club.

1. Seek out opportunities- don’t expect things to just happen for you. Put yourself out there. Send emails to people and organizations that interest you describing yourself, your interests, and inquiring about opportunities. Less than half of those will end up working out, but if you don’t send any, or only send a few, then closer to 0% will end up working out. Get good at presenting yourself and come up with an elevator pitch that you can modify depending on the situation.
2. Do not be afraid of failure. You’ll never forget the things you learned from failing. Nothing great has ever been accomplished without failure. An expert is simply someone who has found all the ways to fail within a narrow field. Focus on what you can learn from your failures. You're gonna hear 10 "No"s before you hear a "Yes". You're going to fail at some things, but don't dwell on the failure. Identify what you can learn, push through it, and do better the next time. What you consider "failures" is not necessarily going to actually affect anything- for example, I got a "C" one time on a Chemistry exam. I felt totally miserable. But then I talked to my professor to try and figure out what went wrong and worked extra hard before the next exam. I finished the remaining exams with As and got an A in the course and that professor has since written me many letters of rec.
   
3. Surround yourself with like-minded individuals who support you in reaching your goals, and support them too. The three keys to success, in order importance, are your social circle, your industriousness (hard work, commitment, diligence), and your intellect. That’s right. Intellect comes in 3rd place. That's coming from me, a veterinary student, who has heard it throughout my whole life from my mom, a physician (internal medicine specialist) who has practiced for over 30 years. Passing the message down to you now. Pass it on to your children, and your grandchildren.
   
4. Think about your application early. Start thinking about yourself. What makes you "you"? What are you interested in? What strengths do you have that you will bring to the profession? By identifying your strengths, you will be able to set the stage for a stellar, strong personal statement. By identifying your weaknesses, you will be able to recognize what gaps you have that need to be filled. Also, look into different schools to identify a few that mean something to you in terms of location, program, tuition—this will help you when choosing which schools to apply to (applications are expensive- applying to 4 schools cost me ~$1,000), writing your supplemental applications, and in making your final choice if you get accepted to multiple schools.
   
5. Collaboration, not competition. Stop viewing your classmates as people to beat. Greater things are accomplished with teamwork. Two of my classmates from my major and I all encouraged and helped each other through pre-vet life and applications, instead of trying to hide information or get a higher score than the other. Guess what? All 3 of us got in to UCDSVM c/o 2020. The people who came at me with a "I WILL BE BETTER THAN YOU AND WILL TAKE YOU DOWN" or "Do this for me so I will look better" attitude either didn't get in to UC Davis or didn't gain my friendship (or help) at all.
   
6. Get out of your comfort zone. When you are comfortable, you are not growing. So get uncomfortable. Go on a whitewater rafting trip. Ask the RVTs you work with to teach you how to draw blood, instead of just shadowing them for the 15th time. Email that professor whose research about algae toxins really strikes you as interesting. Go to salsa night. Have a conversation with the person in line in front of you at the thrift store about the concert tee they're holding. Take the rock climbing class. (Note: practice safety with any venture.) These actions will help you gain confidence in yourself, build your network, and help you find out about opportunities you didn't know about before.
   
7. Get some experience outside of the US. This will be so valuable to helping you understand your humanity as well as how much of a global impact on humans, animals, and the environment you can have as a college graduate, and even more so as a DVM. A great way to do it is through study abroad programs, ecotourism companies, or voluntourism. Some examples are Ecology Project International, Vida Volunteers, and World Vets. Bonus— international experience looks great on vet school applications.
   
8. Work-life balance. Don’t be that typical pre-health student who does nothing but study. Pursue your hobbies. Realize and diversify the things that bring you happiness. This will bring you long term success as well both in the field, for networking, and for your own mental health.
   
9. Reflect on who you are and what unique things you will bring to the field of veterinary medicine. This will help you write a strong personal statement and perform well in interviews as well as choose schools and opportunities that will help you reach your goals.
10. Educate yourself in things you cannot learn from school. Some of my recommendations are: join the debate club to strengthen your critical thinking and conversational persuasion skills; do an undergraduate research project; become a club officer; join a sports team; read non-assigned books for self-education. My top book recommendations are: Lean In for Graduates by Sheryl Sandburg, and Zoobiquity by Barbara Natterson-Horowitz.