It is September already and with the fall season comes a new academic year for our veterinary students, university staff, and faculty. It seems that there is no such thing as “veterinary business as usual” now, and this is also true for our veterinary students. I find it somewhat overwhelming to speculate and write a message about the changes that our veterinary students and academic colleagues are going to face this academic year. As with all my messages, I am writing this well in advance of print, in fact in the middle of a legitimate Canadian July heatwave, and everything seems to change daily. But, learning over the past few months and some speculation suggests that university back-to-school strategies are going to be highly varied from school-to-school and from region-to-region, they will be dynamic and continue to change day-by-day. As we continue to navigate the COVID-19 landscape into the fall, our veterinary students are going to be facing many unknowns with respect to how they are going to obtain the necessary skills and learning outcomes for entry-level competencies. Universities are trying to navigate the delivery of veterinary curriculum via online courses with some face-to-face options for clinical hands-on laboratories. It is a challenging time to be a practicing veterinarian and also a challenging time to be a student veterinarian. Our successors and our academic colleagues training our successors are struggling too. This is also certainly the case for students aspiring to apply to veterinary school. Many universities require mentoring hours to apply, some universities may modify these admission requirements, some may not, and time will tell. Regardless, it is going to be a bumpy path for our current and future students to negotiate and they need our support now more than ever. I mention all this to simply say, when you are able to do so safely, do not forget to reach out and mentor a junior colleague. They are the future of our profession.
Terri O’Sullivan, DVM, PhD
Executive Editor