# Equine Vet qualifications



## TheXRaceHorse (20 January 2012)

Hello,
My daughter is about to pick her GCSE's options and she would like to be a vet.
Is their any vets out their who have any ideas in what she needs to pick?
(She is definatly doing triple science.)
And after GCSE what Alevels and then courses at Uni she needs to take?
Thanks,


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## KSR (20 January 2012)

Have a look on the UCAS site.. It should tell you all entry requirements and at what grade for every educational institution in the uk


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## ofcourseyoucan (20 January 2012)

she also wants to think about getting lots of work exp in kennels/vets/lambing/dairy/chickens/horses etc etc, and a very good personal statement. duke of edinburgh awards are always good, as are team sports,pc/rc teams


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## brightmount (20 January 2012)

Best subjects will include Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Maths. It doesn't matter what other GCSE subjects she picks, but for A level, definitely Biology, Chemistry and either Physics or Maths or both. 

The offers my daughter got a few years ago were just based on 3 A levels, and she didn't take Physics, but struggled in the first year which had a lot of physics in it like locomotion, forces etc.

It's kind of expected you will achieve straight A's, though not impossible to get in with a B or two in the mix, it depends on the university.

An equine vet generally will take a general veterinary medicine degree and specialise towards the end of the course.

ofcourseyoucan's advice about work experience and anything else you can do to make yourself stand out for the right reasons will help in getting a uni place in a fiercely competitive industry.


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## Murphy88 (21 January 2012)

GCSE's - as long as she has the core subjects it doesn't matter hugely, I did all the standard ones plus french, German, history and PE. PE is actually quite useful as you do a lot of anatomy. 

A-level - chemistry and biology, plus ideally physics or maths ( I took maths). If she doesn't like those two then an academic subject like English is a must as the 3rd subject. I only took 3 onto A2 level and got 3 offers, it's better to get straight A's in 3 subjects than stretch yourself with 4 or 5 and only get b's.

And as already mentioned, lots of extra-curricular stuff (I was on football, netball, xc running and rounders teams, did D of E bronze and gold). She probably doesn't need to start doing work ex until nearer the end of her GCSE's, but it would be a good idea to start making contact with vets as they book up quickly. She'll need to do 6 weeks on farm, so lambing, milking, kennels, studs etc, plus 4 weeks at different types of vets. Most people start building this up the summer after GCSE's, until you apply at the start of Second year of a-levels.

There are 7 uni's in the UK that offer veterinary: Liverpool, London, Bristol, Nottingham, Cambridge, Edinburgh  and Glasgow. If you look on UCAS, the course code is D100 if I remember correctly, or just search veterinary science/medicine. AAA or AAB are the usual offers, although by the time your daughter applies it may wel be A's and A*'s only.


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## star (26 January 2012)

qualifications def not the be all and end all when it comes to applying for veterinary.  I had 4A's at A-level (Bio, Chem, Physics and Maths) but they thought my work experience was a little light so had to work hard to persuade them I'd tried my hardest to find farms etc but I live in a rather built up area with v few animals other than horses or pets so not easy!


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