Zoo InternQuest is a career exploration program for high school students. For more information see the Zoo InternQuest Journals. For more photos see the Zoo InternQuest Photo Journal.

Ten years of school after graduating from high school is a tough sentence, I thought. But, if it’s doing what you love, there is no such thing as work. Dr. Pat Morris is the head of Veterinary Services at the San Diego Zoo; he spent almost 11 years in college and has dedicated a lifetime to being the best at what he does. What are the steps to becoming a zoo veterinarian, you ask? To start, you need a bachelor’s degree. Dr. Morris has one in zoology. The D.V.M. at the end of his name means he has a doctorate degree. He also completed internships, residencies, and then finally became a zoo vet.

Dr. Morris says, however, that you are never out of school because often you have to update yourself on the various new treatments and techniques along with just learning on your own from the challenging cases that come your way. One of the latest technologies is the digitizing of X rays. Some of you may have had digital X rays taken at the human hospital. The advantages of the technology are that you can zoom in a lot more, zoom out a lot more, and fix on a certain point a lot better than with film-style X rays. And fortunately for X ray technicians with reluctant patients like parrots or snapping turtles, the digital X rays can focus a blurry X ray so it doesn’t have to be retaken.

After examining the X rays, I got a chance to see how successful I’d be as a vet: I got to suture an orange back together! A suture is a knot made by a doctor to close up a wound; in other words, I gave stitches to a piece of fruit. Dr. Morris made a cut in an orange and let us try to suture it closed using real tools and dissolvable stitches. When it was my turn, the stitches ripped right out! This suture business is a lot harder than it looks. Guess I have to learn a few techniques myself. I just can’t yet imagine doing it on a real animal. I think I am beginning to see why the training to become a vet takes so long.

Dana - Careers Team

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