About the VMBS’ 2+2 DVM Program
The Texas A&M School of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences (VMBS) completed a pivotal step in the development of its 2+2 veterinary program on April 13, 2020, when the school received official program approval from the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) Council on Education (COE).
- With this approval, the VMBS will implement the 2+2 program through its Veterinary Education, Research & Outreach (VERO) program on West Texas A&M University’s (WT) campus.
- This means that additional veterinary students will be able to complete the first two years of their four-year veterinary curriculum in Canyon, Texas.
- The 2+2 program helps fulfill the goal to increase large animal veterinary medicine in the Texas Panhandle.
- The 2+2 program supports Texas youth who have aspirations for careers in veterinary medicine.
- The launch of the VERO program has already tripled the number of applicants from WT being admitted to the VMBS’ veterinary curriculum.
- The 2+2 program will allow the VMBS to admit even more students from WT and the Texas Panhandle region who can then, close to home, receive an education from one of the best veterinary schools in the nation.
Implementation
- The first cohort of up to 18 Texas A&M first-year veterinary students began their DVM studies at the VERO facility in fall 2021.
- Those students will spend their first two years in Canyon on WT’s campus, where they will receive essentially the same basic DVM education provided in College Station, but with convenient exposure to livestock and rural veterinary medicine.
- Every year after, there will be two cohorts at one time cycling through the Canyon location before their third year at the VMBS in College Station, with the option of returning to Canyon for a portion of their fourth-year clinical rotations.
- The cohort will increase the total number of students enrolled in the VMBS’ DVM program to 180—the largest in the nation.
More About AVMA COE Approval
As part of the approval process, the AVMA COE will monitor the implementation of the 2+2 program through the VMBS’s subsequent interim reports. These reports will update the AVMA COE on:
- the implementation of the program,
- additional clinical resources identified, and
- additional faculty and staff hires.
The AVMA COE site team will tour will the VERO facilities and interview students and faculty in the second semester of the second year of the initial 2+2 class (Spring 2023).
Student Applications
Applications for the DVM Class of 2027 will be open soon.
When applying, students may indicate that they are interested in the 2+2 DVM Program in their supplemental application.
Faculty Hiring
Established in 2009, VERO is the partnership between the Texas A&M University School of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences (VMBS)
and the West Texas A&M University (WT) Paul Engler College of Agriculture & Natural Sciences
to bring Veterinary Education, Research, & Outreach to the Texas Panhandle.
