Ag Field Day is an annual event held at Cook College which takes place at the end of the spring semester. It is an all day event filled with games and activities, which enables students to promote their clubs or organizations and also allows Animal Science students to participate in different animal shows. Students sign up for a one credit class called "Animal Handling and Fitting Exhibition," and are given six weeks to work with the animal of their choice. In those weeks the student has to train their animal as well as groom them for the show, and must complete 20-25 hours of service in order to receive the one credit. Students are able to work with dairy cattle, goats, swine, horses, or sheep, and then present their animals to judges on the day of Ag Field Day. |
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| Isn't it about time that you stopped looking at animals and started touching them? (In a good way) Well, the Animal Practicum is your savior to this question. By registering for this course, you'll be well on your way to some hands on excitement with any Cook College farm animal of your choice! There are a wide variety of delicious animals that you may work with including Horses, Pigs (my personal choice), Cows, Sheep, and Goats, all of which offer your body a disturbing smell. While you're not gleefully shoveling feces, you are probably going to be gleefully laying in feces. But that's not all that this class has to offer. By the end of at least one practicum, you will be able to differentiate all varieties of feces that you are stepping in! And although working with feces sounds so exciting, you will also enjoy some baby delivering, grooming, food preparation, food delivering, baby processing, etc... The list goes on and on. The amount learned from this hands on experience is listless. However, I must warn you that these classes are a hot commodity and are taken up quickly. I urge you to stay in contact with the Society of Animal Science, and get first pick at the special permission numbers you need to get in. Good luck and have fun!! Return to Top |
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| Animal Science Problems, course 11:067:493 and 494 is one of the 3 courses offered by the department that fulfills experience-based education. AS Problems offers the students a unique opportunity to participate in a professor's current experiment. Each professor performs research projects in their area of expertise; for example, Dr. Katz's research may include behavior studies performed on goats, sheep, or deer, while Dr. Ralston's research may entail some studies on geriatric horses. The main task of the students in AS Problems is usually the gathering of data, ranging from observations in behavioral studies, to recording weights in growth studies, and so on. The courses run in both semesters and are by arrangement only. You must contact the professor that you wish to work with for details and a special permission number. It can be taken for 1, 2, or possibly 3 credits, depending on the professor, their need help in the studies, and your available time. For each credit you commit to, you must devote 3 hours per week. Return to Top |
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| Dairy Cattle Artificial Insemination is a 3 day, 1 credit class that takes place during Spring Break. Spring Break?!? That's right, you'll been spending Spring Break the way you have always dreamed! The program is brought to you by a company called Genex, and for those 3 days, you will be taught everything there is to know about dairy cattle AI, from anatomy to semen handling. But the fun just begins. Following the classroom portion of the program is the actually practice of what was learned in class, on real cows! When the three days are up, pending the results of your examinations both in class and out in the field, you'll be a certified AI technician. This class provides AS students with another option besides vet school. Take this class and you'll be inseminating like a pro in no time! Return to Top |
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| Have you always pondered what the difference between an American Bison and a Buffalo is? Well, if you want to find out, you've got to join the Society of Animal Science to be selectively chosen to attend a spectacular Buffalo trip. There you will learn a great deal about these tremendously amazing and wild beasts up close and very personal. Get a chance to tag/number there ears as they thrash back and forth in a strong yet weak looking containment. Show your creative side as you may be asked to bring out the rattlesnake inside of you to scare off the raging creatures back out onto the pasture. There is also a possibility to penetrate there thick, tuff hide with a hideously scary, long needle with the elixir of life (vaccination). And after a hard days work, enjoy a bask in the sun with the Doyle family and there friends as the bull cattle makes its daily round of "moos". Return to Top |
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| This element of the Society was started in the fall of 1999 as a way designed to give students some hands on experience. The major focus of the short hands on classes is to give members a chance to see what working around a particular animal is like. This will help younger students in planning which practicums and classes they may be more interested in taking. For more advanced students the hands on committee offers a chance to do something that they may be interested in doing but just never had the time to take any of the classes. Previously students have had the chance to learn about processing pigs. While several groups of students went down to observe the procedure, observations were not the only things they did. This meeting allowed several students to actually try their hands at processing pigs. Future events may include milking cows, large animal handling, working with horses, and trimming hooves, so watch the website and Society meetings for more information. Return to Top |
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Experience is hard to find in the world of animals when you have so much competition. Because of this, Cook College provides a unique program for it's students known as Cooperative Education (Co-op for short). Co-op is a program designed to give students a chance to experience a career while obtaining college credit for it. Some examples that many of our animal science friends engage in are work at a veterinary clinic, at a zoo, on the Cook farm, at a major theme park (Disney World, Great Adventure...) at a research facility, pharmaceutical corporation, and many others. The Co-op has an enormous listing of possible jobs that you can find, and if none of them fit you, you can just ask the place you want to work if they want to participate in the co-op program. Some of these internships are paid, as others are not, but all in all it's the rewarding experience that counts. (But money is still good). Most students prefer to carry out their co-op during their summers, but if you have the time, or you are crazy enough, you can do it during a semester (or two). This opportunity is extremely beneficial to do in your undergraduate years at Cook, for it gives you the chance to realize whether or not you are in the right major, or if you will like doing something else. It's a wonderful thing. This is a picture of former publicist Steve Vendome at a business meal during his internship this summer at Pfizer in Manhattan. Return to Top |
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