1. Your past experiences: In autobiographical form tell us about yourself with particular emphasis on those formal and informal learning experiences which have had the most impact on choosing the career field that you have.

I grew up surrounded by animals, so I imagine this was where my desire to become a veterinarian ultimately started. There was always a dog, a cat, and a rabbit in my house to take care of, and I spent a good amount of my time over at my grandparent’s hobby farm surrounded by horses, chickens, guinea hens, and multiple barn cats to care for. No matter what the job was, I always enjoyed working with the animals. As I grew older, the fun at my grandparent’s farm began to be tempered with work, as I officially started working there during the summers with a large part of my responsibilities revolving around the care of the animals. After my sophomore year of high school, I also picked up a job at a local dairy farm as a milker, working throughout the year as my schedule permits. I found that working with the cows was something different than what I was used too, but it was a good change. I’m able to shadow the veterinarian when they come out to the farm for herd checks once in awhile and I have found that I don’t mind working with cows either. Throughout high school I was also involved in the agriculture classroom as much as possible, particularly through FFA, which allowed me to broaden my animal experiences. These, along with the experiences I have gained thorough animal science classes I have already taken at UW- River Falls all have come together to help me choose the career path I am on and to continually solidify my decision that I wish to work in the agriculture industry as a large animal veterinarian.

As I stated before, animals have always been, and still are, a big part of my life. I wanted to find a job where I could continue to work with animals, particularly the large, farm-type ones that were such a big part of my childhood. Becoming a veterinarian seemed a logical way to achieve this and be able to do something that I love.

In the short-term, one of my goals is to complete a majority of the classes required to apply to veterinary school by the end of my sophomore year, which would allow me to matriculate a year early into veterinary school and still receive a bachelor’s degree from UW- River Falls after my first year of veterinary school. Another short-term goal of mine is to also complete the requirements to graduate from the honors program at River Falls, which will take some careful planning on my part if I’m to enter into veterinary school after my junior year, but I’m confident I can make this a possibility. Lastly, I hope to keep offsetting the cost of college with scholarships and by keeping my current jobs. I’ve been able to save a significant amount of money with scholarships so far, and I plan to continue to apply for and hopefully receive as many scholarships as possible to keep my cost of attending college to a minimum. This, combined with the money I can earn and save from working should help me to achieve this and help me avoid taking loans out too early.

Long-term, one of my goals is to graduate with a veterinary degree by the time I’m 25, which is very doable with my present situation. I also plan to achieve high grades and GPA while in college, preferably staying somewhere in “A” range. Finally, my biggest long-term goal is to gain employment close to my hometown after finishing my final rotation, which shouldn’t be too hard considering that I live in a really rural area. My long-term goals really lead into the answer of where I see myself in 5 years. If everything goes according to plan, I will be entering into my last year of veterinary school and finishing up my last set of rotations. I will begin to search for employment opportunities close to my hometown and will be getting ready to begin making a life for myself as a new and fully licensed large animal veterinarian.

4. What is YOUR definition of conservation (not Webster’s etc.), and why is it in important to conserve and manage wildlife and environment?

Conservation to me is managing and preserving something in the best and most sustainable way. It is important to conserve both wildlife and our environment because we are all intrinsically connected. Everything has its place in this world and helps other species and organisms survive. Oftentimes, if a species isn’t properly regulated and conserved, other living beings suffer because of it. If we as humans choose not to conserve and manage our wildlife, and by extension our environment, we are ultimately destroying ourselves and our ability to survive in this world.

I grew up in an extremely active trapping family. Some of my earliest memories are of going trapping with my dad and sitting in on trappers education classes that my parents were teaching with my uncle. Our family vacations were planned around trapping conventions and other events and I grew up helping with Wisconsin’s state convention every year, going so far as to receive the volunteer of the year award in 2017. Growing up with a trapping lifestyle, I was given so many things. I have a very loving “trapping family” that is as close as my real one-even if we only see each other a couple times a year, I know the value of hard work and persistence, and most importantly I was raised to see the benefits of trapping and not the stigmatized version that much of the generalized public believes. Trapping, along with hunting, fishing, and any other type of management practices all have their benefits to modern society. These types of practices help prevent overpopulation in areas where a species’ growth may be getting out of hand and damaging the ecosystem. It also provides society with nuisance control by keeping sick, weak, or just plain nuisance animals from interfering with domestic animals, crops, and other aspects of daily life. Lastly, these types of activities help to stimulate the economy and provide jobs for all those involved in the process, whether it is the person selling the means to do this, the consumer of these services, the provider of the service, or those who are making a living of the by-products of trapping, hunting, and the like.