Lauren Larson knew from a young age that she wanted to become a veterinarian. She worked to achieve a high grade point average all through school and even took college-level courses in high school to hopefully give her an edge when it came to getting accepted into vet school.
But getting into veterinary school is competitive. Only about 10 percent of those who apply get in. And the first time she applied, Larson did not get in. She persevered and today she is President of her vet school class.
“When I first understood what a vet was, when I was 3, 4, 5, that was always what I set my heart on.
Her name was Sydney, she was a Shih Tzu, and my family ended up adopting her. She kind of chose me from the first day I started taking care of her. She became my dog very quickly. She loved to cuddle, loved to lay around and she always slept with me.
There is just something about your first dog. It was very special.
I would say there are a lot of life lessons. It was really hard. You work your entire life for one thing and when it doesn’t happen, it is very disappointing. It really pushed me to make my resume and make my vet school application better. It also pushed me, because at that point I was still in undergrad here at SDSU, so it pushed me to have a really good last few semesters, grade-wise.
Pretty much, when I didn’t get into vet school, I started working full-time at my hometown clinic in Mitchell, which gave me more experience than I could ever ask for.
I am currently in the 2-plus-2 Veterinary Medicine Program at South Dakota State University. I am in the first class of the program. So, it’s pretty much a split program where you do your first two years of vet school at SDSU, then your third year, you transfer over to the University of Minnesota.
There is just something about being a voice for those animals and being an advocate for those animals. That is always something I have really wanted to do.
