Career change advice

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Hi all,
I am a 24 yr old non diagnosed Aspie or just a person with many Aspie traits, not sure which. I am currently an electrical engineer in the defense industry. I am successful at my job, in fact just got a promotion. However, lately I have been considering if I would be happier if I pursued my childhood dream and went to vet school.

Animals are my passion and I am prepared to dedicate my life to helping them. This poses a few obstacles though:
1. I am missing quite a few prerequisite classes. I could take them at a local community college, but then I would not be able to pursue a masters in my current field, which is paid for by my job.
2. My husband is not supportive of this endeavor. We are planning on buying a house in the next year and this does not work well with that (though I would probably need about 5 years of part time prereq classes before even applying). I am the primary income source for the household.


What are your thoughts on this? Am I crazy for wanting to leave a good job to chase a dram?

How crazy you are depends on your plan for what to do if things go wrong.

If you try something like that, be assured that it will not go as expected. You will need to have an idea of what to do if you decide you don't like it anymore, have financial trouble, etc..

You might try taking evening classes or volunteering with an animal shelter for a few months before making any final decisions, and saving some money just in case.

I suppose I should mention that I do already volunteer at a shelter regularly. I have 2 dogs of my own as well. I'd have more if I could.

I would not leave my current job until I was accepted into vet school. I would take night classes and flex my schedule if necessary.

Once I have a DVM my first choice would be zoo medicine, second research or specialty medicine (neurology interests me as an EE), third choice typical small animal clinic work.

Sounds tough!

Which of the options has your preference?

Veterinary schools are extremely competitive with many applicants seeking admission...so, be prepared with a back up plan if you decide to pursue such a goal. It may help to get an opinion from a local Veterinarian in your area and one who is willing to be a mentor for you.

However, it sounds like your husband is your biggest obstacle to overcome...

Best of luck to you!

Well my backup plan would be to stay on the path I am now. I am not unhappy at my job; content would be a good word to describe how I feel.

The underlying reason for this is I've wanted to be a vet for as long as I can remember. Problem is I have always been a "wiz" at math. I won just about every math competition I ever entered including the citywide math contest in my 90,000 person city growing up 3 times. An adult told me when I was about 12 that being a vet would be a waste of a math mind and I should pursue something like engineering, and well... Here I am.

if your primary goal is to help animals there are ways to help that can be more beneficial and actually incorporate your engineering mind. like working for peta, or other nonprofits that help animals. if you can think of a method to stop meat industry, now that would be something.

if you want to do research like new drugs, or methods, transition from EE is easier and you pick things along the way. you just need to choose some interdisciplinary topic.

do you need to do dissections in vet school? can you survive that as an animal lover.

My ultimate goal would be to improve the lives of animals, yes, which is one reason why the research aspect interests me.

You bring up an interesting point. I would love to find a middle ground and a job that I can do in the animal field that fits my current education (or a few more classes). I searched for something like that when I first graduated but came up empty handed. If you or anyone else has some ideas, I am all ears. I'd love to find out about other opportunities out there.

The dissections in grade school never bothered me.

kiska,

first you'll need to find a program that does interdisciplinary things and find a prof who does research in these areas. then contact the prof and ALWAYS make sure he/she is someone normal. then get GRE and apply to a program. if you get into phd in sciences, usually you get a small salary.

I know that here people in EE department do software for improving the analysis of protein data basis. alos lots of physics majors do theoretical work on analysis of drugs or protein folding. i can not really tell you more because i don't know anyone from animal science but lots of googling can tell you.
probably you can find people who do stattistical analysis of animal migrations or tracking of endangered species.
sorry that i can not be more specific but the thing is there is much more freedom with advanced degrees and there is no need to go with a load of coursework instead people concentrate on topic.

also you can look at magazines nature and science
http://www.nature.com/ and http://www.sciencemag.org/ and check out people who do animal work. these are usually paid but if you need a specific article, i can get it through my institution and email it to you. anyway than you can email them and check out how to work for them.
i am very busy now but next week i might have more time to help you.

kiska, couldn't find anything useful in journals, anyway i had an idea to develop software for dissection and they made it. so you can do something like that, or here are databases that help minimize animal experimentation. and also vet schools have interdisciplinary programs.

also maybe it is good to contact peta and ask them if your expertise would help?

anyway here:

http://www.tufts.edu/vet/academics/grad ... grams.html

http://www.library.ucsb.edu/istl/00-sum ... ernet.html

http://www.lib.purdue.edu/vetmed/alternatives.html
http://www.mercer.edu/psychology/Facult ... ght_JC.htm
Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/20 ... 215636.htm