By: Keith Kappes
Columnist
Carter County Times
Please forgive this terrible pun but it’s time to hold the horses in the well-meaning effort to establish a veterinary medical school in Kentucky.
I say it’s time to pull the reins because a rush to judgement by the General Assembly would base the school at Murray State University at the far western end of the state.
House Bill 400, sponsored by Rep. Richard Heath, R-Mayfield, would authorize Murray State to offer doctoral-level veterinary degrees.
I am using horse analogies because our Bluegrass State is facing a livestock crisis because of a worsening shortage of large animal veterinarians. It’s hard to imagine Kentucky’s horse industry in peril because veterinarians can make more money while working shorter hours taking care of pet dogs and cats than they can treating horses, cows, mules, goats and other farm animals.
Since Kentucky has never had a vet school, we send our future veterinarians to train at Auburn University or Tuskegee University, both in Alabama. Kentucky students get a tuition break at both because our state pays part of the cost.
Passed by the House last week on a vote of 82-6 with more than 50 co-sponsors, the bill now is before the Senate Education Committee. It definitely appears headed for passage.
We are aware that Morehead State University has been offering degrees in veterinary technology for about as long as Murray State and has great facilities at the Derrickson Agricultural Complex near Morehead.
Moreover, Morehead is somewhat closer to the center of the state than Murray but geography should not be the deciding factor. Since the Murray proposal endorses the “distributed learning model” that allows students to take classes from several locations, wouldn’t it make sense to base Kentucky’s veterinary medical school at both institutions?
By the way, among the House co-sponsors of the Murray bill are Reps. Patrick Flannery of Olive Hill and Richard White of Morehead. Surely they don’t want Morehead State, local students, and livestock farmers in East and Central Kentucky to be shortchanged in this process.
(Contact Keith at keithkappes@gmail.com).