Back in 2022, Rosemary Klass, a senior veterinary technician at the University of Minnesota Veterinary Medical Center (VMC), was brainstorming ways to recruit the next generation of veterinary technicians, assistants, and doctors of veterinary medicine (DVM).

She had been invited to do so by then-VMC director Pat Berzins to cultivate a goal to expand the pipeline between young people who were interested in pursuing veterinary medicine in the future—and at the VMC.

“Getting to them young is truly the best way to do that,” Klass remembers thinking. “Sparking and cultivating the interest of those who either know they want to get into the field, or to get on the radar of students to help them consider veterinary medicine or science as a potential career.”

Klass helped create that vision from scratch. They then launched the Bridge to Vet Med program, designed to connect with grade school and high school students.

“I did what came to mind, which was to connect with the schools,” says Klass, who reached out to career advisors, guidance counselors, and principals about the opportunity to connect their school with the College of Veterinary Medicine (CVM) at the University of Minnesota (UMN).

Bridge to Vet Med attends career fairs, presents at schools, and hosts onsite field trips that allow students to glimpse inside the VMC, as it still does today. A freshman at Robbinsdale Virtual Academy named Julius Harris became the first student to gain job experience at the VMC.

For Harris, working with animals was a natural fit. He’d grown up with a rabbit and a dog as pets, and animals seemed to be naturally attracted to him. But still, he had never considered a career in veterinary medicine. Instead, he thought he’d end up in the tech industry. Joining the Bridge to Vet Med program completely shifted his path.

“Students think anything with medicine is expensive, and that they have to go to school for a long time, so they don’t even look into it,” Harris says. “This is a great way to put this in front of students as an option. People just don’t know about it.”

The summer between his freshman and sophomore years, Harris started a paid work-learning position at the VMC through the Bridge to Vet Med program. Over the next two years, he learned some bandage techniques on test models, sat in on anesthesia and surgery prep, and observed the intensity of the intensive care unit (ICU). He also helped keep the primary care service cleaned and stocked, which made up the brunt of his duties.

“The biggest thing for me was getting to experience the culture there, everyone is doing their part,” Harris says. “The biggest eye-opener for me was that there were doctors and surgeons who were doing the same tasks that I was doing—they were taking out the trash. Everyone is chipping in to keep the wheel turning.”

Surgery left the biggest impression on Harris, now a senior in high school. He is applying for a veterinary technician assistant job in the VMC’s surgical unit after he graduates. Harris will have a chance to get the hands-on experience in veterinary medicine that the observation he did through Bridge to Vet Med exposed him to.

“I got to see the preparation it takes,” Harris says. “I’m a very organized and clean person, and getting to see all the tools needed to do that job made me very set on surgery prep as a job.

The next chapter

On any given month, Klass leads about three groups of high school students through the halls of the VMC. Three years in, Bridge to Vet Med has already reached more than 200 students. Sometimes the students are there just for a day event. Other times, they come in for a few hours over a couple of weeks to attend teaching labs and observe procedures.

“We’ve had a few students come for the mini internship, where they spend two-to-three hours with us and are able to be in surgery, rotate through other services, and try to get in as much information and behind-the-scenes experience as possible there,” Klass says. “If they do a shadow event, I give them scrubs—they put on a bouffant, booties, and a face mask, and we go into surgery, and the doctor explains to them what they are seeing. They just love that.”

Klass always takes students to her old stomping grounds—the ICU—where the hospital’s most critical patients stay. They get the run-down on anesthesia and sometimes see the VMC’s CT scan machine.

“We might pop into cardiology, where sometimes, when they have an appointment, students get to look at an echo being done. The doctor will explain to them what they are observing and what’s happening in the valves of the heart,” Klass says. “The goal is to expose them to as many areas of vet med as possible. It is such a vast and incredible field that we would love to have them explore.”