Shelter Education Activities

1. Companion animal welfare, professionalism, community service and leadership are now being introduced to VM I students in their
   first semester in the required course: Veterinarian In Society.
   The learning experience includes discussion hours.
2. Hands on experience in an animal shelter is occurring in an elective course: Clinical Foundations. This course is available to VM I students and 50 students were enrolled in Spring 2003. The objective is to offer students the opportunity to perform physical examinations on shelter animals and learn more about shelters. The participating shelter was the Animal Rescue League of Iowa. Their Chief Veterinarian, Dr. Dan Campbell, participated in the educational experience along with ISU faculty.
3. A pilot Shelter Medicine lecture elective was taught Spring 2003 and was offered to VMI, II, and III students. The course covered infectious disease, behavior, shelter design, the veterinarian’s role, and other topics. There were 55 students enrolled. Speakers for this course were from the sheltering community of Iowa, Illinois, and Nebraska.
4. Spay and Neuter Before Adoption involves area shelter animals and our VM III and IV students. The shelter owned animals are brought to ISU and our students, under faculty supervision, perform sterilization procedures. Approximately, 250 surgeries were performed last academic year.
5. Clinical Small Animal Overpopulation, Medicine and Surgery electives, at large regional centers with in-house veterinary staffing, are available for the VM IV students. These rotations are two weeks in length. Students are involved primarily with spay and neuter activities but also participate in general health care. Thirty students elect these rotations yearly. The shelters that participate are the Animal Rescue League of Iowa and the Nebraska Humane Society.
6. Feral Cat Alliance is an organized group of veterinary students that spay and neuter community feral cats. Faculty volunteer to supervise the students. Currently, 150 students work with this program.
7. Other educational opportunities are available for student programs, such as Iowa’s “Neuter a Tom Cat” days. This program was developed by one of our current students and is expanded yearly.
8. Our students voluntarily participate in Community service to shelters. We are interested in fostering this type of relationship and we are working on formalizing this community service for college credit.
9. The College has provided support to local veterinarians who are looking to expand their low-cost neuter days.