Every summer at CVM, Dr. Dan Rockey organizes two weeks of veterinary workshops for fifth and sixth-graders from around Oregon. It’s part of OSU’s Adventures in Learning (AIL) and provides hands-on, small-group experiences for high-ability students. This year, Rockey has an assistant who knows all about AIL.
Katie Moreno, a high school junior who participated in the AIL program when she was in grade school, is working as a guide and mentor to the 12 students who visit the OSU Veterinary Hospital each morning. Her job is to greet the students and introduce them to the faculty person who will lead the workshop. She also answers questions and keeps an eye on the students so they don’t wander off.
Yesterday, Katie helped large animal internist, Dr. Keith Poulsen, herd the group through Magruder hall and into a stall where Clementine, a teaching cow with a surgically attached fistula, was waiting.
First Dr. Poulsen used a model of a bovine rumen to demonstrate how a cow digests food. Then CVT Betsy Snyder showed the kids how to put on arm-length gloves and Dr. Poulsen invited them to step up and reach inside Clementine’s rumen.
Most of the kids thought it was pretty cool,” says Moreno, “but some were grossed out. One guy wasn’t going to do it, but the other kids encouraged him and he gave it a try.”
Moreno is used to being around veterinary hospitals; her mom is Dr. Sarah Maxwell, a veterinary opthalmologist who occasionally teaches at CVM.
One of Moreno’s favorite memories of her AIL veterinary experience was dissecting brains in the necropsy room. “That was very interesting and something you could not do anywhere else,” she says. Moreno also remembers watching a dog on the underwater treadmill. “When the dog got off the treadmill, it ran up the ramp and jumped in the therapy pool. It was pretty funny and he splashed everyone,” she says.
Dr. Keith Poulsen helps a student find the digested grass inside a cow rumen.
