In their final year, students are scheduled individually into 8 different rotations of four weeks duration. Two of these rotations, medicine and surgery, are assigned by the Director of Fourth Year Clinical Curriculum. The remaining six rotations are selective rotations in that they are selected by the student in collaboration with a faculty advisor and approved by the Committee on Clinical Instruction. Students are encouraged to choose these selective rotations with the goal of further exploring or focusing their career aspirations. Their choices of rotations are not limited by geography; they may select applied veterinary settings (clinical practice, laboratory, consultant, governmental, etc.) locally, regionally, nationally or internationally. Students in the fourth year can also elect to complete up to 8 weeks of Independent Study which allows them to schedule clinical rotations in other disciplines for one or two weeks duration.

4th year Frequently Asked Questions – FAQ’s

Time Commitments

Scheduled Time:

• Selective rotations:
  • Contact time: 40-60 hr/wk (or more, on occasion)
    • rounds
    • outpatients
    • inpatients
    • business meetings
    • record maintenance
  • Non-contact time: 20 hr/wk
    • Library/computer/case research
    • Learning objectives
    • Reading

Self-directed, individual study time:

• Approximately 10-20 hr/week

4^th Year Disciplines

For their assigned CORE Internal Medicine rotation, the students have the option to request CORE Small Animal Internal Medicine, CORE Equine Internal Medicine or CORE Food Animal Production Medicine. For their assigned CORE Surgery rotation the students have the option to request CORE Small Animal Surgery or CORE Equine Surgery. Their remaining 6 selective rotations can be selected from this list of disciplines: