Hi Dr. B! 

Email update as requested :) I just got back from all my summer travels about three weeks ago, and I've been very happily catching up on sleep and hanging out with my family (and Shannon!) since then. 

The summer was a total whirlwind - two days at home before flying to Sri Lanka to see Shannon, a week there, and then to Thailand. I was in Thailand for about 6 weeks, which was really great. I ran three two-week long programs, and in each one we spent one week volunteering at Elephant Nature Park and one week exploring the city of Chaing Mai. It was crazy fun and exhausting to be the leader for the groups of students in Thailand.  

After Thailand, I was in Israel for almost two weeks doing the birthright program, and Jack and two of my other friends from home came with me for that. It was really interesting being in the Middle East and getting to understand a little bit more about the conflicts over there (although there's still so much I don't know or understand about the political climate and history there). After Birthright, Jack and I went to go meet the rest of my family in Spain. It was great to travel with my brother (Mitchell) and my parents and have Jack along - it had been a really long time since my family went on a vacation all together, and it was Jack's first time on an overseas trip with us. We ate too much in Spain, got some time on the beach to relax, and saw great dancing and art.

I had a few days at home, and then took a road trip down to Southern California to move Mitchell into UCLA (he's a junior this year and moved into his fraternity house). While I was down there, I spent a week with my best friend from high school, Gabby, in San Diego. I also stopped in a few places along the coast coming back up to the Bay Area to see other fri

My plan right now is to take this fall and winter quarter off, and go to Tahoe in the winter to teach ski lessons to little kids. Then I'll come back to Stanford for my coterm spring quarter. I'll be studying Conservation Biology and Sustainability with the Earth Systems department. My first two quarters back at Stanford (spring and summer), I'm planning on studying at Hopkins Marine Station down in Monterey, and I'm already imagining all of the underwater kelp forest pictures I'll have to take while I'm down there. One of the classes I'm planning to take is Kelp Forest Ecology, and we'll scuba dive every day for class! 

Attached are a few photos I took from summer!

~Andy

Hi Dr. B!

Second year is pretty tough as far as our exam schedule - often only 4 or 5 days apart, and we feel lucky if we get a full week now haha. I’m very glad anatomy is over now though. I added on a couple of things to my schedule this year, including spending Tuesday afternoons at New England Wildlife Center for a different kind of experience and taking some CE VIN classes on wildlife at night. My time at NEWC is very different in that I’m suddenly the only vet student and getting to do exams, run blood draws/rads, do wing wraps/PT, and even minor surgical things on my own! I amputated a squirrel toe a while back under guidance (and kept the toe in formalin :)). I also reduced my first elbow luxation in a pigeon two Tuesdays ago and it’s doing well! While there are a bunch of things that they do that I really don’t agree with, I’m sort of compartmentalizing with that and getting a ton of experience applying the things that I learn but don’t get as much of a chance to do on live patients at Tufts, since the 4th years take priority.

As far as on campus things go, I still spend as much time as a can at wildlife and have a really good mentor there who has taught me a ton already. I’m also good friends with the vet interns this year (one of whom lived with me last summer), and I learn a lot from/with them as well. I’ve been practicing pinning avian bones on cadavers quite a bit this year so far, and my goal is to have a really good grasp on avian ortho by the end of the year. Then on to learning soft tissue surgery techniques next year! That kind of thing keeps me motivated through tough class times, and I went backpacking in the White Mountains a couple of weekends ago as well to see the leaves. I’m still working in the ER at the hospital, though I may try to transition into working at whichever place I’m going to be at this summer for that time frame in the spring. I’m hoping to get a job at a place that sees a lot of exotics to strengthen my grasp on avian and reptile medicine, as there’s often more money available for diagnostics and treatments when animals are owned. I don’t want to end up in exotics, but as it’s pretty hard to get paid for wildlife things around here it’s a compromise to working in small animal again. I’m also still working in wildlife in a work-study capacity this year!

How are you doing?

Avery 

p.s.  My mentor is Maureen Murray, who is board certified in avian medicine and who does the majority of the clinical work these days. Dr. Tseng is still there two days a week but is hospital director and so has a lot more demands on her time outside of the clinic. Dr. Murray is great as a teacher in that she is incredibly knowledgeable but also patient and fun to work with. I basically want to be her as a vet haha…but also work with more mammals.

I am just over three months into a radiology residency at Davis. So far it has been incredibly fun.

Sabrina

March 2017

Hi Dr. B!

Things are going well for me! I can't believe this semester is almost over - it's been a fun one! I'm taking (and enjoying!) pathology this year, so I'm thinking of all of you Stanford veterinary pathologists frequently!!!  

This summer, I worked in a lab at A&M, where I used qPCR and next generation sequencing to study antimicrobial resistance in food animals. This was a wonderful opportunity to explore my interests in human, animal, and environmental health. I presented my work at the veterinary student research conference at the NIH, where I got to meet some of the vet students from other schools who did their summer research at Stanford! I'm still working in the same lab part-time this semester, which has been a great way to further develop my skills and to stay in touch with the truly wonderful people in the lab. I'm also playing a bit of polo again with A&M's polo club - whenever the weather and my schedule allow. I'm afraid things get pretty busy with school again next semester, but I've loved having a less time-demanding schedule this fall and appreciate feeling more settled now that I'm in my second year.  

The more I talk with other vet students, the more I appreciate what Stanford gave me - as a student in general, but particularly as a pre-vet student. You and the other vets at Stanford had SO much to do with that - I honestly don't think I'd be where I am without you and the Comparative Med team. Sure, I was willing to "work hard" to get to vet school, but I would've had to have worked a lot harder and experienced a lot more frustration along the way without the support of you and the Stanford vet team. As Thanksgiving approaches, I'm still so thankful for you and the other Stanford veterinarians who support the Stanford pre-vet students!!!!

All the best from Texas!

======================================================

July 2016

This spring (2016), I accepted my offer to the Texas A&M College of Veterinary Medicine, and I have been happily reestablishing my roots in my home state. I am wrapping up an intensive six-week anatomy seminar for incoming first year vet students without prior anatomy coursework (sadly, I became pre-vet too late in my Stanford career to take Dr. B's course!). The past few weeks have been a WONDERFUL chance to get a head start on the material, to meet my fall anatomy professor and some fellow vet students (a third of my class took the course with me), and to settle in to Aggieland before things start in earnest in mid-August. The workshop was not for credit, so there was no pressure - just a much-appreciated chance to learn! 

This fall, A&M's vet school will move to an entirely new facility just down the road from its current location - needless to say, everyone is very excited! A team of Aggies (including my anatomy professor!) visited Stanford Medical School as they designed the new vet school facility, so I am hoping to feel right at home once the buildings open. As similar as the buildings may be, the weather here could not be more different from the Bay Area climate - it's HOT, HUMID, and rains frequently in the summer! Missing those cool California nights and dry climate, but thankful to be surrounded by some great people and to be starting vet school at last.

I'm happy to talk to any current pre-vets about my experiences, ESPECIALLY if they are interested in A&M - Aggieland is great, but the admissions process here can be quite an adventure! Feel free to share my contact info. 

Thank you again for reaching out!

Best,

Elizabeth Lake

elake.tx@gmail.com

Hi Dr. B! 

Second year is going well. I spent part of the summer at a mixed animal practice near Redding and got see and help with a lot of horse and cattle repro. I also was a TA for a biomedical science summer class for highschoolers at UC Davis. Now I’m trying to decide what track I want to do (probably livestock) and what to do next summer.  

Davis doesn’t have a real mixed animal track, if they did I’d probably go that route. I feel like at this point I know more about small animal, so if I want to do mixed/livestock the livestock track might make the most sense. I still have some time to decide though, which is nice. I don’t remember Justin, but that’s awesome! It’s so interesting to see how people change and find new interests. 

Also - I don’t know which vet schools you went to over the summer, but I was at Georgia a couple weeks ago and their new teaching hospital is beautiful! Big plus if you have any prevets thinking about applying there!

Nicole

Hi Dr. B!

I'm doing well also! We're just about to finish our second block, hematology/immunology. Vet school has been a fair amount of work but also a lot of fun! There are a lot of really cool opportunities here. One of my favorite things Davis does is put on free clinics for underserved communities; we do one in a tiny farm town, and one in Sacramento for the homeless. They're amazing opportunities because the students get to take the lead on the case (I like to call it being "pretend vets."). We do physical exams, talk to the clients, and give basic treatments. For anything more complicated, we have vets that oversee us. Another thing that I really enjoyed was helping out with some of the kitties that came to Davis after the wildfires; their injuries were pretty unique (some of the younger vets I worked with hasn't treated burned patients before) and it was really nice to be able to help out with everything going on. I know Liana helped out a lot with these kitties as well.

Also, I know interview invites are starting to come out for c/o 2022, so please let me know if there is anything I can do to help out!

Best,

Aurora