119 www.ReadMPM.com | www.MountPleasantMagazine.com | www.MountPleasantPodcast.com Imagine having the chance in high school to be around animals every day – in class. If you’re an animal lover, that’s the dream. At Lucy Beckham High School, those dreams really do come true. Their Career and Technical Education (CTE) program offers an opportunity unlike any other in the state: veterinary sciences classes and a dose of real-world experiences for students who are passionate about animals and considering a future working with them. While the first class is open to anyone, the upper-level classes require an application, and those students can work their way into volunteer and paid internships and graduate from the program equipped to pass their Veterinary Assistant Certification exam. “These internships and this program are gold!” smiled Alex McCarrell, CTE department head and veterinary science teacher for the program. “Students that have this program along with general and specialty vet internships under their belts are a shoo-in for colleges, so that’s where the value is.” Other students, she added, get hired straight from their internships and work their way up to become vet techs, and still others find employment with kennels and boarding facilities. Students in the upper-level classes get hands-on experiences and regularly vaccinate, microchip, deworm and draw blood as part of class. They also learn quickly that caring for animals is not always cute and cuddly, but McCarrell’s silver lining is that the hardest cases can at least be impactful and educational. “We had a litter of ‘bag puppies’ that were thrown out of a car. They had parvo and a slew of other medical issues, and we nursed them back to health. One died, one almost died. That was a hard but beautiful learning experience for everyone,” McCarrell said. “They were able to see a live birth this year and helped raise and adopt out the puppies. We had a kitten with a horrible neck wound that we nursed back to health and adopted out, and then another with a broken leg and bone cancer – unfortunately in that situation it had to be euthanized. These are tough experiences, but the students gain so much.” This school year, McCarrell started Meowdog Animal Rescue. Though not affiliated with CCSD or part of the curriculum, it is run by McCarrell, the Vet Club, volunteers and students, and there is a symbiotic relationship between the two – the rescue animals are subjects for the veterinary sciences program, and then are fostered and eventually adopted. At the time of this writing, the veterinary sciences program had helped rescue 230 animals since it started in 2020. For those interested in helping, Meowdog is always in need of fosters and adopters, transporters, monetary donations and more, but McCarrell stressed that even if someone can’t offer these things, sharing posts on social media is a wonderful way to help the animals find their forever homes, and in turn those adoptions make more openings for the vet students to continue bringing in new animals in need. “I look around my room at my students with different interests and from all walks of life who would probably never have been friends out in the rest of the world, but they are best friends because of this program,” McCarrell beamed. “No matter who they are, what they believe or where they come from, they come together and help these animals grow, trust and heal – they come together for the greater good and forget about all that other high school stuff. I love watching it happen, and this program makes it all possible.” BY ANNE SHULER TOOLE The Purrfect Opportunity Lucy Beckham offers vet sciences program pets
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