The general pre-requisite courses for colleges of veterinary medicine are shown below in the table. These requirements can vary widely by institution, so students are strongly urged to obtain information from all schools of interest and be sure to incorporate the required courses into their four-year plan.
COLLEGE OF VETERNINARY MEDICINE |
MBC EQUIVALENTS |
English (6 hrs.) |
ENG 101 and ENG XXX |
Calculus (3 hrs.) |
MATH 211 |
Statistics (3 hrs.) |
PSYC 250 |
General physics with labs (8 hrs.) |
PHYS 201-202 |
General chemistry with labs (8 hrs.) |
CHEM 121-122 |
Organic chemistry with labs (8 hrs.) |
CHEM 221-222 |
Introductory biology with lab (4 hrs.) |
BIOL 111 |
Genetics |
BIOL 222 |
Microbiology with lab (4 hrs.) |
BIOL 255, 256L |
Biochemistry (3 hrs.) |
BIOL 324 |
Humanities/social sciences (6 hrs.) |
Basic studies |
Business/finance (6 hrs.) |
Any business or finance course, including accounting and economics |
All of the above courses must be completed with at least a C-. Students are encouraged to take as many courses as possible to reflect a liberal, but targeted education with the following biomedical-related courses as a guide:
By the spring of your junior year you should take the General Records Examination, or GRE, (some schools require the Veterinary College Admissions Test, or VCAT), then over the summer begin to complete the Veterinary Medical College Application Service, or VMCAS application. By fall semester of your senior year you should submit the application through VMCAS. Letters of reference are an important component of the process so it is extremely important that you contact your referees very early in the process.
In addition, most schools require completion of the GRE, a test consisting of three sections: verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning, and analytical writing. Each of the multiple-choice sections is scored on a scale of 200 to 800. The average scores for the GRE are about 470 for verbal reasoning and 570 for quantitative reasoning. The analytical writing section is scored on a scale of 0 to 6. Some schools also require that applicants take the GRE subject test in biology. Applications to take the test can be obtained online or by contacting:
GRE-ETS
PO Box 6000
Princeton, NJ 08541-6000
