What an Experience!

Ariel Fowler, LSU

Experiences, Entry

In the first week of June, between the anatomy finals of first year and an exam in my first week of second year, I arrived in Post Falls, Idaho. There, Dr. Betsy Charles asked me and a roomful of other veterinary students, clinicians, and faculty members to “step off the treadmill” of endless studying and commitments. That was our welcome to the Veterinary Leadership Experience. In that week, I learned not just leadership skills but life skills—and had more fun than a name like “leadership experience” might suggest!

A major theme of the week was Challenge by Choice—the idea that each of us should try to stretch beyond our comfort zones, but with the understanding that those comfort zones are different for every person. From the very first evening of mingling and secret handshakes and creative teamwork, we embraced those challenges. At VLE, I met students from other veterinary schools, but I also befriended and learned a lot from clinicians and researchers and even the videographers who shot our highlights reel. We started every morning with a dance that made the whole day more positive, and finished the evenings with field games, bonfires, movie nights, or karaoke.

Much of the time in between, we spent in our small groups. Each group was led by a few facilitators and consisted of about a dozen participants. I might be slightly biased, but I think my group was the best. I could tell you about the zoo and wildlife vet who calmly directed our group through a relaxing iteration of what other groups thought was a particularly frustrating exercise. I could tell the story of the professor whose limitations prevented her from physically participating in many of the challenges, but without whom we could not have completed any of them. I could recount the St. Matthew’s student who gave a rousing speech encouraging all of us as we attempted the helium stick challenge that becomes a curse word for its difficulty, or the equine vet who wanted to hear all about my little brother and what else I was doing over the summer. But the easiest way to share a view of my group is to list some of the values we as a team chose on the first day and lived throughout the week: inclusion, patience, encouragement, and, possibly most of all, fun. As we physically and mentally worked together through each puzzle or obstacle, we grew closer as a team and learned a lot about ourselves.

Each morning we talked about Meyers-Briggs personality types as well as communication skills, and VLE had activities geared towards introverts as well as extroverts. Some afternoons were spent reflecting on our lives and our personal mission statements, or writing a letter to ourselves about what we experienced that week. We even completed one task that seems almost antithetical to the logically oriented veterinary population at VLE: we each painted a small canvas. That task was more challenging for some of us than others, but by the end of the period, every one of us had made a work of art. We put them all on the wall together, where they made a large, colorful whole that everyone had participated in.

Whether it was painting art, singing on stage, or doing a trust fall, every participant in VLE did something that week that they had never before thought they could do. In that single week, we each grew so much as leaders of ourselves and in the profession. I am so glad I got the opportunity to participate in the Veterinary Leadership Experience, and I encourage anyone else: if you have the chance to experience VLE, go for it!

Comments

[martha littlefield, dvm, ms, cva]

Good job, Ariel! I know that you will step up to leadership positions in your clinic, community, state or nation! We are type A, just because we are where we are, and, as a person that has been in leadership roles and now retiring out of them, I can do so with confidence with such programs as Dr. Charles'!