Externships were the topic of conversation on the latest episode of the “Talking Sh*t Veterinary Podcast,” where large animal veterinarians Dr. Spencer Wolter and Dr. Erika Nagorske, both of Minton Veterinary Service, share stories and experiences from their careers.
When Wolter arrived for one of his final veterinary school externships, he expected a typical week of shadowing veterinarians and observing cases. Instead, on his first day, a veterinarian asked a question he wasn’t prepared for: “So, what three projects are you going to complete while you’re here?”
“I showed up expecting to shadow veterinarians and instead got handed three projects,” Wolter recalls.
The externship was at a large dairy operation, and every student who came through the program was expected to identify problems, develop solutions and present recommendations before leaving.
“It was my last externship and my last rotation,” he says. “I had already accepted a job. I was basically ready to coast into graduation.”
Instead, he spent evenings walking facilities, talking with employees and looking for opportunities to improve daily operations. One project focused on cattle flow through the parlor. Working with maintenance staff, he helped install visual barriers designed to reduce distractions and improve movement.
Years later, the change was still being used.
The experience taught Wolter a lesson that had little to do with dairy management and everything to do with professional growth: “You get out of an externship what you put into it.”
How Veterinary Students Can Choose the Right Externship
Looking back, one of Wolter’s biggest regrets is that he didn’t travel farther.
Throughout veterinary school, he focused heavily on externships that seemed likely to lead to future employment opportunities.
Today, he wishes he had spent more time exploring different places and production systems.
“Go somewhere geographically you’ve never been and always wanted to go. That’s something I regret not doing as a veterinary student,” he advises.
For Nagorske, one of those opportunities took her across the country.
As a veterinary student, she knew there was one skill she wanted to improve more than any other.
“I really wanted to dial in my rectal palpation skills, and I knew if I wanted to truly get my numbers in while I was in veterinary school, I would have to go somewhere with a lot of dairy cows,” she says.
That goal led her to California’s Central Valley, where large dairy operations provided an opportunity to perform far more pregnancy examinations than she could expect in many other settings. Years later, she still views it as one of the most valuable externships she completed.
Wolter has similar advice for students considering their options: “You’ll never have this opportunity again as easily as you do when you’re a student.”
Evaluate Job Opportunities Through Externships
Externships can also reveal what students don’t want in a future career.
“You can’t hide a clinic culture for two weeks,” Nagorske says.
An interview shows a practice’s mission statement and compensation package. An externship reveals how people treat one another when the workday becomes stressful.
Nagorske encourages students to look beyond the veterinarians themselves.
“Talk to everybody. Don’t just have an interview with the owner. Talk to the support staff, the office staff, the admin staff. How people treat each other tells you a lot,” she says.
Wolter experienced that lesson firsthand at a practice that appeared ideal from the outside. The clinic was respected, busy and successful. It seemed to offer exactly the type of career he wanted. After spending time there, however, he realized the reality didn’t align with his long-term goals.
Discovering that during an externship was far better than discovering it after accepting a position.
Build Clinical Skills During Externships
Nagorske’s California experience highlights an important reality of veterinary training: Seeing a procedure and becoming proficient at it are not the same thing.
Whether the goal is pregnancy diagnosis, surgery, ultrasonography or cattle handling, competence requires repetition.
“You can’t expect four or 10 externships to make you proficient. You have to keep putting in the work,” Wolter says.
Veterinary school provides the foundation, but confidence develops over time.
Nagorske encourages students to approach each externship as part of a larger learning process.
“You don’t have to learn everything during one externship. Just keep building skills one experience at a time,” she says.
Why Mentorship Matters During Externships
Ask veterinarians what they remember most from veterinary school, and many will point to a specific person rather than a specific procedure.
“Students remember the people who invested in them,” Nagorske says.
The best mentors do more than demonstrate procedures. They explain how they make decisions, communicate with clients and navigate difficult situations.
That responsibility also extends to veterinarians who host students.
“Hosting a student should be intentional. It should be a good opportunity for them, not just another body following you around,” Nagorske says.
Strong mentorship benefits both students and the profession itself. Today’s students will eventually become tomorrow’s associates, practice owners and mentors.
What Students Learn From Mistakes
Not every memorable lesson comes from success. Sometimes the experiences that stick the longest are the ones that go wrong.
Wolter remembers one involving a liver biopsy sample collected during a cattle research project. After a difficult procedure and a successful sample collection, the team celebrated. Moments later, the sample container slipped from his hand, rolled across the floor and disappeared through the slats beneath the calves. The sample was gone.
Today, the story gets laughs. At the time, it didn’t.
“The mistakes are usually the lessons you remember the longest,” Wolter says.
Externships provide students an opportunity to learn those lessons while still working under the guidance of experienced veterinarians.
More Than a Graduation Requirement
Externships help students evaluate employers, develop technical skills, discover mentors and gain a better understanding of the profession they are entering.
Sometimes they confirm a career path, sometimes they change it.
For Wolter, the lesson is still the same one he learned during that unexpected dairy externship years ago: “You get out of an externship what you put into it.”
The most valuable externships aren’t always the easiest or the most comfortable. They’re the ones that help students discover what kind of veterinarian they want to become.
