USU working to combat veterinarian shortage with new veterinary program
Mar 31, 2025, 11:45 AM
The Glen L. Taggart Student Center at Utah State University on Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2024. (Kristin Murphy/Deseret News)
(Kristin Murphy/Deseret News)
SALT LAKE CITY — Utah State University announced a new 4-year veterinary degree program. This would be the first and only veterinarian school in Utah.
USU was part of a collaborative veterinary program with Washington State University for more than a decade. But this week, it achieved another step toward its goal of putting an end to the statewide veterinarian shortage.
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The College of Veterinary Medicine is now accepting applications from students who want to enroll in the fall. The Dean, Dirk Vanderwall, said 40 students will be accepted in the first year.
“And with the availability of the new veterinary building, we will be able to increase our class size to 80 students in each class cohort.”
Vanderwall said the veterinary program is partnering with Nevada, which will help students from the Silver State with tuition.
“Our neighboring state of Nevada has seen the value of our program being established at Utah State University (and is) helping to serve the needs of training more veterinarians for the state of Nevada.”
The construction of the new veterinary education building will be complete in the summer of 2026. A full spectrum of training will be offered, including rural agricultural training, and full accreditation will be granted after the first class of students graduates.
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