Two Hollister natives
– and best friends – realize their dream of being
veterinarians
They met as first graders at Sacred Heart School, and as girls
with similar interests tend to do, Carrie Kelsch and Jenni Dike
quickly became the best of friends.
Two Hollister natives – and best friends – realize their dream of being veterinarians
They met as first graders at Sacred Heart School, and as girls with similar interests tend to do, Carrie Kelsch and Jenni Dike quickly became the best of friends.
Sharing a love of animals and the outdoors, the pair grew closer. They joined 4-H together and worked on several joint projects. They entered high school, staying close, even working at the same part-time job
And as they grew older, Carrie and Jenni shared something else – the dream of becoming a veterinarian.
Nearly 11 years later, their dreams are being realized, as both women will soon add the word “doctor” to their names. And although their shared career goal took them down different paths, both say they couldn’t have done it without the other.
“We were a good team,” said Carrie, 28, now living in Michigan with her husband, Matthew Allen. “We had a lot of fun. We both had a lot of pets growing up and animals were just something we had in common.”
Carrie graduated from the Veterinary School of the University of Wisconsin on May 18; Jenni will graduate June 15 from the veterinary program at U.C Davis. Although veterinary programs are notoriously hard to get into, Carrie says that neither one of the women ever gave up on their dream.
“It was a really long road for me,” she said. “It took me several years to even get into [veterinary] school.”
Carrie and Jenni graduated from San Benito High School in 1996, and moved on to separate colleges – Carrie to Purdue University in Indiana; Jenni spent two years at Gavilan College in Gilroy before transferring to the University of California at Davis in 1998.
After graduating from their respective colleges, both girls began applying for veterinary school. But with thousands of applicants vying for just several hundred openings nationwide, Carrie and Jenni found out making a dream come true isn’t always easy.
“I found out several things,” Carrie said. “I found out when you are not a resident of the state where you are applying to go to vet school, it’s difficult to get in. And in California, it’s even harder to get in, because there are a limited number of spots. It is very, very competitive in California. Getting in can take a really long time.”
Carrie moved back home for two years, earning her Master’s degree from San Jose State University. She moved to Wisconsin when she decided it would be easier to get into veterinary school if she left California. She worked as a chemist and got married while re-applying each year to the Veterinary School at the University of Wisconsin.
Helping her through the stress of trying to get into vet school was Jenni, who was going through the same ordeal back home.
“I wanted to stay at Davis, but their veterinary program is pretty hard to get into,” Jenni said. “Typically there is something like 2,500 applicants for 122 spots. But it is something I really wanted, so I kept trying.”
After graduating from Davis in 2001, Jenni spent two years away from school, working and re-applying to veterinary school. A new school at Western University in southern California opened, and Jenni applied there as well.
The girls’ efforts eventually paid off; in 2003, each received acceptance letters – Carrie to the veterinary school at the University of Wisconsin and Jenni to the program at Davis.
“Those first couple of years of applying and not getting in, having to think of other options, were really hard,” Jenny said. “It’s nice that we actually got in the same year.”
Friends and co-workers
Graduating from veterinary school is not the first thing Carrie and Jenni have done together. Not only had the pair been friends and classmates since the first grade, they also joined clubs together, such as 4-H, and even worked at the same place.
Theirs, however, was not the typical after-school job. Carrie and Jenni worked as volunteers at the Nan Pipestem Wildlife Rehabilitation Center in Paicines. This was a rare opportunity for the girls, as it was unusual for the staff to allow teenagers to work there.
“When I was 12, I went to an open house at the center, and filled out an application to be a volunteer,” Carrie said. “I don’t know why Nan let us come out, because their volunteers were always adults. But she would have us sweep the deck and stuff, and she let me go into the songbird house. The mourning doves were flying around me, and I just thought how wonderful it was to be there. I must have done a good job, because they let me come back.”
Carrie’s mom, Judy, would drive her out to the center on weekends, and shortly after she started there, Carrie invited Jenni to tag along. One of the girls’ weekly chores was to feed the barn owls.
“Sunday mornings we would gut mice and chop them into little pieces,” Jenni said. “It didn’t bother me at all. Those were some great mornings. Even after we graduated, we would come out, gut mice and squirrels and catch up on the week. It was like talking over coffee.”
“We were a good team,” Carrie agreed. “We would gut rodents for the raptors for hours. Nan and Meredith [Nan’s daughter, who helped run the center in the 1990s] were really good teachers, and kind of like family to us. We still keep in touch.”
Carrie and Jenni also took the 4-H Veterinary Science class, taught by local veterinarian Charlie Tobias, working together on joint projects for several years.
“We were both in the vet science class, and I was doing a documentary on a pair of young red-tail hawks. I wanted to follow them, and I needed a camera person. I recruited Jenni, and she just kept coming with me.”
“We spent a lot of time together,” Jenni said. “The class was fun. We would go over basic veterinary skills, and learn about topics such as diseases, animal husbandry and how to keep animals healthy. We also took an anatomy course, and we put together a horse skeleton once.”
Their strong friendship helped keep the girls’ dreams of becoming veterinarians alive.
“I started thinking about becoming a veterinarian in high school,” Jenni said. “I started spending a lot of time with Carrie out at the center and at 4-H and then I knew it was what I wanted.”
The next step
Carrie graduated from the Veterinary School at the University of Wisconsin May 18; since then, she has been applying for jobs with private veterinary practices in the Detroit, Michigan area, where she lives with her husband, Matthew.
“I can either do an internship or go right to work for someone,” she said. “I’ve already had several interviews [since graduating].”
She says she is not sure what field she would like to specialize in, but for now will probably work in general medicine.
“That’s the million dollar question,” Carrie said. “I tracked as a mixed animal vet, and in a perfect world I would work with rural animals, but my husband has a very urban job, so that may not happen for a while. I’ll probably try to mix cats and dogs with exotic animals such as birds and reptiles.”
Jenni, on the other hand, plans to take a break before beginning her career in veterinary medicine.
“I’m taking the summer off, as sort of a mental health summer,” she said. “In the fall, I’ll start looking for something. I’d like to do general medicine, but I’m open to anything.”
Both women acknowledge the support of family and friends, as well as teachers and mentors such as Nan Pipestem, Charlie Tobias, Bill Chen, Gary VanGerben, Bill Johnson and local veterinarians Robert Wilson and Melvin White.
They acknowledge one other thing – the power of lasting friendship.
“I think all our friends are all really happy that we got into school at the same time,” Carrie said. “This is something we’ve always wanted to do. It took a really long time, but I just figured that eventually everything would work out.”
“It would have been really hard, I think, if just one of us had gotten in,” Jenni agreed. “Now, it’s really cool because we are graduating at the same time!”
