Hi everyone and welcome to the first in a nice short series that we've got for you coming up on Vet Chat, and one of the most powerful and and resonating responses we had to every one of our episodes was being to the episode about diversity, and I know from a personal perspective. I took a lot of learnings from that and had to go away and do a lot of research to, to educate myself. And seemingly a lot of you in the veterinary community also did exactly the same thing, which to me is great, because actually it shows that it drummed a message home.

And I know one of the, the things that we discussed very briefly in that was access to the profession. So we thought actually we need to go and drill down a little bit into these topics a bit more. So under no pressure at all, Daniela, who is current president into her last month of presidency at the BVA in what we are all aware, has been really a very quiet year for the organisation.

There's been, not much for her to do, and, you know, as, as has been a concern for many people over the years, you know, really twiddling her thumbs through through the last 12 months, and there's of course no. Sense of sarcasm about what I've said there. Daniella, it's great to have you, to have you again and looking at, you know, what we can sort of drill down into as, as diversity in the profession, and I know that an access point to the profession is something that we, we have, have both privately and, and publicly talked about previously.

And you and I have of course got very different journeys into the profession. I'll give you mine in a minute, but I just thought, Daniela, could you describe, You know, that sort of journey from deciding to wanting to be a vet, to actually, you know, getting into vet school, you know, that's, I think it's certainly one that that testifies resilience, but, but if you could tell people, you know, how you go about getting in and every challenge you face, that'd be brilliant. I almost feel like I should start singing like I'm in the sound of music.

Let's start at the therapy. Anyway, right. So, sorry.

Yeah. So, my story. I am an inner city kid.

Grew up in central London. My parents are immigrants, but I was brought up in a single parent family. So, my mom's a cleaner, We have no history of anybody going to university, let alone any science background.

And I knew when I was very young, and it was because of a fish that I wanted to become a vet. So. So, we had a pet fish, the one they started swimming upside down, I now recognise probably swim bladder or something of the like.

But I was very, very, very upset and I forced my poor mother to stay up all night poking this fish. And when I woke up, And when I woke up in the morning and the fish was still alive, I was determined. I never wanted another animal to suffer.

And that's why I decided to become a vet. But I was tiny at this point. And I guess, my determination continued, but for reasons that I suspect we'll get to as this conversation goes, that the, the journey wasn't straightforward.

So, you know, I did very well at, at GCSE. Went to an inner city comp. Went to 1/6 form that entry at that point was based on your.

At GCSE. And I thought, right, let's do this because it might give me a bit of help. It might make my, my journey a bit smoother.

Oh, how wrong was I? For various reasons, I didn't get the grades, which I think we can come back to later as well. And in the end, it took me 5 attempts and a completely separate degree to get into vet school.

So, I guess that I had many challenges. I think, to me, the overriding positive and constant was actually my mother saying to me, I don't care what you do with your life, as long as you're happy. And to me, being happy meant becoming a vet.

And so whilst we didn't have the money, you know, she didn't have the background to help with, getting you there, there was always that support. There was never a wavering of support saying you need to stop now and you need to think about something else. So yeah, that's my story.

Yeah, and I think that's almost. The polar opposite in terms of education journey, but very, very similar in terms of familial support to my journey and I, I was really lucky, you know, I mean, similar inner city kid, although a much smaller city in Liverpool, and I decided when I was 9 watching an episode of Vets in practise, or maybe it was vet school, I think it was Vets in practise at that stage, where, you know. Oh mate, it was like, you know, those of you that have grown up in the YouTube.

Generation, like you, you used to actually have to tune into the TV at the right time. Otherwise you were screwed, there was no catch up, there was nothing. It was like, you know, I think it was like 8 p.m.

On a Sunday night, and at that stage I was still at the age where it's like, right, OK, bath, get ready. OK, we're down. It's 8 o'clock, Sam, we can have a cup of hot chocolate, unlike now, where we're all sat there with a glass of wine on a Sunday night.

And and you sat down and watched this vets in practise, and I remember distinctly. This shows how relatively rusty my farm knowledge is, but it was a cow with an LDA, but it was a two vet job. So those of you who can do DAs single-handedly, as I'm sure many farm practitioners can nowadays.

Great, but this was a two-sided job, frankly, I thought it was a little bit overkill. Of course you did. Big time, at the time, I was like, surely they could do this surgical procedure.

Quicker and and more more cleanly, but that just, that just flipped the switch. And I was just at the local CAV primary at that stage, not particularly academic, but also not particularly thick. But my parents, the, the local senior schools around us were all right.

I didn't get into like the, the equivalent of the grammar, like it was a really high functioning school, a lot of friends from school got in there, they got in. I didn't. But I got offered a place at a private school on the other side at Liverpool that we were fortunate enough to get a a little bit of a discount on for taking in a, a little scouse ginger kid.

I was like, come on, give, give this kid a chance. And, and do you know what, that was at the time I hated it because I was like all my mates were going to other schools, class size was smaller, but I look back with the benefit of hindsight. And the opportunities and the doors that that education has opened for me are seismically different to the opportunities that the friends from primary school have got in life.

And again, you know, you can sort of throw your toys out a little bit when you're at school, kind of go, oh my mates are going here and doing that, and everyone lives 45 minutes away, and did I mention that all of their dads drive Ferrari? And you know, my dad turned up in his Volvo. My dad had a Volvo as well, it was an orange rusty Volvo and it rained inside.

Safe and sturdy, you can't beat yeah. But it was just, and that, that gave me so many opportunities, but I've only realised that, and I was really weirdly ashamed of the opportunity that it gave me, and I was always a bit reticent to say, oh, do you know what, I went to private school. But then I turned up at vet school, and you know, I, I had to work, I had to properly grasp to get my grades, and I scraped them by like one mark.

We were the first year to do AS levels and A2s, and I literally scraped it by one mark. But at no way, shape or form did my parents ever say anything other to me, Dan, you'll do it. But you have to put the graft in.

Like, you know, I did work experience at Chester Zoo, which was like 45 minutes from our house, and I did a month there, and my dad drove me and picked me up every day. And that is, you know, it's, we go on about the sacrifices that we make to get to vet school, but other people around us that we don't identify at the time, cos you, you know, your kids, you're focused in your own little world. But you look back and go, God, do you know what, the, my mum and dad had made, I mean they have had some dinners out on us over the years, but they opened the door for us, you know, they, my mum's entire salary went on sending us to school.

And that was a conscious decision they made. A, a, a decision they could make, cause the, the flip for me was I managed to get, I think, 2 weeks' work experience on a farm. And I ended up having, and actually I did another one on a stables.

So the stable one's interesting, I couldn't get any London stables to let me do work experience with them, because it's not. What you know, it's who you know in those sorts of situations. And the only place that did was a place called Whiteleaf, which meant I was on the train for an hour and a half to get to these stables in the morning, and then an hour and a half back.

But even the train ticket for that was a stretch. I did the same to get on, I actually managed to get an abattoir placement, which now is really difficult to get. But at the time, I managed to get it, and it was somewhere in Essex, again, I had to get a train out, walk an hour, and then walk an hour back to the station.

So, yeah, you're right. We often don't see those that have helped us get to where we need to go. Mm.

And I think one of the things that it still resonates with me to this day, and I had, you know, I, as, as at the time you were allowed to apply to 4 vet schools, and, and I applied to the two Scottish ones and got straight rejections, Bristol and got an interview. I remember getting grilled at Bristol about dairy farming. And ended up turning round to the chap and saying mate, you do realise that like, you know, I, I'm in the middle of Liverpool, like the closest I get to cow's most of the time is Tesco's.

You know, other, other, shopping establishments are available and and do definitely shop local. If only you could all see his face right now. But like, you know, it is, and it's the, it's really interesting because of course, like for me, I, I look at it and I just go, had I had the opportunity to learn about farm stuff beforehand, I'm fairly sure, like I loved my farm work.

And, and I got a lot out of it, and I feel as though I could offer a decent service. But pre-vet school. Like, we went on a farm working holiday as a family, so my mum was an epilepsy nurse specialist, and they did a big holiday away in Devon for like 2 weeks every year.

And that, that was basically my farm work experience. But I went down, and rather than doing all the stuff they were doing with the, the kids for the, the couple of weeks, I just spent the time working on the farm. And I did that for 2 summers, and that was the only exposure I could get to farm work as an inner city kid.

But then of course you get to vet school, and I remember like there being a load of these guys who had grown up on farms and done this and that and the other, and you're like, wow, you know, these guys, their experience is just phenomenal. But I think it's really important that as we have these conversations, we don't make people feel bad for having those experiences, or those connections or having gone. To private school.

I think it's really important, because often when I have these conversations, people take it as me having an attack, you know, or, or it being an attack on people that have been privately educated or have farming backgrounds or equine backgrounds or whatever. And, and that's not at all. But I, I do think when we're talking.

About increasing access to the profession, we have to acknowledge those sort of extra bits of help that some people have, and accept, and there's good evidence behind this, that someone's background really does define their chances in terms of outcome. And it's why the profession looks the way it does. Yeah.

And obviously you talk about the profession looking the way it does. For those that don't know, can you just give us some of the headline figures, if you like, of sort of, you know, what our profession is made up of, where do we come from? Yeah.

So we are, I don't have the exact stats to to hand, but we are significantly disproportionately privately educated. Only about 3.5% of the profession is from a black or minority ethnic group.

And our gender is skewed as well. Now, we can have a whole conversation about gender, but we are becoming an overwhelmingly female population. And the interesting factor, the reason I, I do bring that up is that often when we start talking about diversity, people go, but what about the boys or the men?

And actually, that question comes back, or that answer comes back to exactly what we'll be talking about, which is access. Because we are not in a situation where, you know, boys from a middle or upper class background or with family background in science or whatever, are choosing, it's not that they. Can't get into vet school.

They are choosing not to. And so, to me, we need to reframe, especially around the gender, rather than saying, What about the boys? We need to ask, what about the working class boys, for example.

So why, so there are, there are boys that have access that are choosing not to come into the profession. But there are boys that don't even consider the profession, and that's where the skew comes. So, yeah, overwhelmingly, privately educated, we don't have any form of ethnic diversity, really, and we are heading towards predominantly female professions.

So that's where we are at the moment. But there are good reasons for it. Yeah, and I, and I think, you know, as a profession, obviously the last two decades have been monumentally.

Disabling isn't the right word, but there's been seismic changes in the profession over the last 20 years, like, you know, I got into vet school in 2002. And God, that seems like some of you are in vet school now and thinking about vet school, you weren't even born when I got in, so you know, embrace your youth. She probably, probably born the year you went to, anyway, horrible to think about this.

It's OK, we're still fine. But, but yeah, you know, I mean like when, when I got in, you know, there was majority independent practise, etc. Etc.

So you know, corporate practise wasn't really a thing, but it was very much considered that to go to vet school you had to be. The cream of the cream, academically. And I hold my hands up, and those of you that have ever worked with me or come alongside of me will probably, I dare say, agree, I am not the cream of the cream, you know, I'm, I'm intelligent and I am pragmatic and sensible.

But how do we get the message out to why the society, not, you know, the veterinary profession is tiny, and our touch points with why the society is actually massive. You think of how many. Any consultations we do with people that have got kids that maybe want to be a vet and so on and so on.

We've all had that consult and where it's like, oh, you know, would you, would you do it again? And how many of us have actually, oh God no, or how many of us have said, yeah, do you know what, do this, do that, the other, but how do we get people to understand what you actually need to be a vet? So, if we step back a second, the problem we are facing is not exclusive to the veterinary profession.

The reason why. Our profession looks the way it looks. Isn't necessarily the fault of the profession, it's a systemic problem, but it's something that we need to recognise and accept.

So, just a couple of things that you said there. You know, we, there's this perception that you have to be academically exceptional to even get into vet school. The application rate at the moment, in terms of application to places is 2 to 1.

So, we're not actually as competitive as most of us think, because when you speak to most people, they'll say, the vending profession is the hardest one to get into. Not factually correct. When people, when you're talking about seismic shift, and, and people talk about the gender shift, for example, The percentage of women applying has always been the same.

That's a fact. It's just been sort of, it's, it's flipped around in terms of, let me rephrase that. So, it was, from the beginning, it's been overwhelmingly female applicants.

But because of a smaller number of spaces and, and how people are, were accepted, it was an overwhelmingly male, male profession. As time has gone on, numbers have increased. We have to be clear that the demographics that apply, the demographics that you see in the In the profession.

So, you know, if you look at whether you look at gender, whether you look at ethnicity, whether you look at educational background, they reflect. So, it's not that we are having a bias issue at the point of selection. Our problem comes before selection.

Our problem comes in talking to kids and getting them to consider it. And There is some really, really good evidence out there as to why it happened. So those of you that have spoken to me about this before will have heard about the Aspires project.

Have you heard about this, Ben? I've heard it, but I don't know about it. Yeah, so the Aspires project is something, it's run by KCL and it is a longitudinal research project, right?

And it has looked at kids and started at like tiny. I think it's somewhere between 4 and 8 years old. And those kids, they follow through and those kids are now at university.

And what they've done is they've tracked their attitudes towards STEM subjects and their aspirations and what has actually happened to them. And there is some really, really interesting data that's come out of it, which, if we step back, reflects perfectly in terms of what we see in our, in our profession. So, one of their key, so there's a few key findings, but one of them, for example, an interest in science doesn't necessarily translate to science aspirations.

So, if you ask kids, they really, really enjoy science. That is not the problem. It's not that we don't have kids that enjoy science.

But it comes back to what you were saying. Kids don't see it's for them, they don't think they have the correct mind. They don't think they're clever enough.

They think that it's, you need to be specifically brainy. And so whilst they're interested in it and they see the value in it, the desire to pursue it falls because they have, they don't have any self-belief. The interesting part is that the whole of the educational system is what patterns that belief in society's belief.

So. And I think if we So if we think about that, that's probably where you and I have been lucky. Because we both saw, had an interest, and we were, we were both encouraged to do it.

And despite the fact neither of us saw ourselves as clever enough. Someone said, You can do it. So, so that's one aspect.

So, we have kids out there that would probably love a career in vet medicine, but they don't see it as for them. You know, they don't look up and see people that look like them. They don't look up and see people that came from their backgrounds.

So, that's one thing. I think the key thing that we've also touched on is science capital, and there's a difference between you and I when it comes to science capital. So, science capital is about an individual science-related.

Exposure. So, what around them, so do they have people around them that are, have science-related qualifications? Do they understand science-related stuff?

Do they have a knowledge about science and how it works? Do they have people who are interested? Do they have social contacts?

Do they have access to books and things like that? Which is why we have a difference. You have the access to social contacts and to the people that could take you.

I didn't. And so, let's think about a kid that has, thinks science is interesting. But their only exposure to science is those random science lessons.

They don't go home and have books. They don't go home and watch vets in practise. They don't have parents that can take them to farms.

So there's another barrier. So that, and that there is actually an example of the difference between being privately educated and not. Yeah.

Cause in private education, you said, the doors opened, they would have really pushed you. They would have, you know, you would have had smaller class sizes, therefore, more interactive science lessons. And so there's that aspect.

And that Is a social problem, primarily because it doesn't matter how good you make the schools, if you go home and there's nothing there. That's the problem. Interesting thing though, I'm talking a lot, so do interrupt me.

Outreach programmes. Outreach programmes aim to increase a person's science capital. By providing role models and by picking an interest.

But one thing we have to accept is that outreach programmes alone have a limited effect, which blows some people's mind. But let's think about it. You go into a primary school.

And you meet a 9 year old, and you refuse that nine year old for to become a vet. Right, they will, their interest peaks, they'll spend a few weeks reading books, looking on the internet, doing all of this. But then they go home and their parents show no interest.

Or they have no contacts, or they don't have a computer. So they can't look on the internet, or they have no money to buy books. So they can't do that.

Or the school just keeps telling them it's too hard to be a vet. You've picked that kid's interest, but it just drops off because there's no consistent aspect there. So.

I think we as a profession often reach for the outreach programmes, and they are brilliant, but we have to accept that they've got limited reach. The most interesting aspect, I think, of this is that the education system in this country is patterned by social inequalities. So, it's very much down to how good your teacher is and the funding your school has.

So, if you are in a school that has high teacher turnover and you've got a different science teacher every term, the likelihood that any form of education is going to Is going to stick and make you interested. It's pretty low. And that is why I say, let's not ask where are the boys.

We ask, where are the working-class boys? Because the boys that go to private school or high attaining state schools have all of this. They have all the opportunities.

A kid that I went to an all girls school, but, you know, a kid that went to a type of a boy that went to a type of school like mine would have a constant uphill struggle. And there is what we call gatekeeping at in throughout the education system. So you know when you said people you you think you have to be the creme de la creme to get into vet school.

This education system thinks like that about science. Rather than looking at science and seeing, this kid has an interest, let's push them, they go, This kid has an interest, but actually only a C-level student. Let's funnel them away from a science career and encourage them to go to more soft careers, which I hate that word, because every career has a skill, but, you know, they'll push them more towards the humanities or something like that.

So, imagine, you're a poor kid from an inner city school, right? You have high turnover of teachers and teachers that keep telling you can't do it. You don't have any science capital because your mum's a cleaner, your dad's not around.

You're looking after your, your brothers and sisters all the time. Your school doesn't, you know, sort of push your interest and gate keeps you away from it. And then society in itself, because you don't have the money to reach work experience because you don't have the contacts, further bats you down.

And that's why we have the profession we have. Now, it's not an exclusive problem to us. People often look at the medics and go, Well, look at the medics, they've done really good.

Their ethnic diversity is great. Sure, dial down into it, 80% of medical students come from 20% of schools. So actually, all we've done is encourage those that have the, the background to consider a medical career.

We've not done anything about the social inequalities that leave so many behind. So I'm gonna stop talking now. But that's the sort of, the complexity of how we increase access.

It's not straightforward. Yeah, and it, like you say, it's so multifaceted. And, and the one thing that resonates with me is the fact that so many people, and I, I know some people like, you know, through church and different bits and bobs like that, who, you know, the kids are great.

I, and I, I, I have to say I look at this now with, you know, the benefits of a few winters behind me and go, do you know what, you'd be an absolutely awesome vet you. Like you just, you engage with people, you're good at communication and stuff like that, you know, skills that. When I started at that school, CoSkills was like a new thing.

And, and we were really lucky because we had Carol Grey at Liverpool, who was one of the, you know, very, very, founding members of this sort of comSkills generation for vet students. But so many kids now don't realise where their strengths are, and of course they're drawn to things that are socially apparent to them. And you know, you see them on Facebook, you see them on Instagram, you see them on all of these other areas of the profession, and that's what they engage with.

And I think as a profession, that's maybe what we, we don't do particularly well. And I, I don't know whether you how you feel about that, but to me, I think there are, you know, of course there's downsides to being a vet, and you know, we're all palpably aware of them, but there's some fantastic sides to it as well. I, I still think our profession is overwhelmingly positive, and I wouldn't choose to do anything else.

But you're right. We don't engage with the people that we should engage with. And as a profession, we still have this attitude, and I'm talking broad strokes here, we still have this attitude that academic ability is the be all and end all, and if you're not a straight A student, then you're never gonna make it.

You're not capable of making it. When in reality, if we step back, it is about common skills. Of course, you need to have a, you, you need to have a, a, a, a, a basic academic ability.

You can learn all that, but the reality is your clients are only gonna only gonna. Sort of accept you and follow your advice and have positive outcomes if they trust you. And that comes down to.

But I think the wider thing here is, there has to be a profession-wide concerted effort and determination to make a difference. My, my biggest fear when we start talking about widening access is all the fragmented attempts to do it. And that is not gonna have the long-term outcome.

I, I, I sometimes think that the fragmented attempts make. The feel good factor in that immediate aspect, but the reality is to increase, increase part and widen participation. Your outcome, the output to show you've had an an impact is gonna take 10 to 20 years.

So it's gonna take 10 years before you see it in the vet school, it's gonna take 20 years before you see it in the profession. And the reality is, we all need to come together and do it. And so, you know, BVA held a widening participation workshop with lots of stakeholders talking about this.

And, and I, I, I guess, my challenge is, we, as professionals need to stop perpetuating this fact that we need to be something special to be a vet. Yeah. Fact check, we don't, we're ordinary people who happen to look after animals for a living.

So we need to stop perpetuating that. There's probably a place for re-evaluating what work experience we we need from these students. Let me ask you something.

How much did we learn cleaning poop out of kennels for two years? How, how did I really. I mean, I, I, I do run a tidy household now.

But yeah, no, I think that's it, it's like, you know, it's the. Again, it's that sort of qualitative versus quantitative, isn't it? It's like, you know, I spent Saturday mornings from 14 years old in a vet practise at the bottom of my road, I was really lucky, it was literally 200 yards from the house, and it was with a proper old school vet who's sadly no longer with us, he died I think about 2005, 2006, a guy called John Adams, and he was.

Broad's got every consult with a pipe, effing and blinding his way through it, like, you know, I remember going home from the first ever day there cos they they'd been our family vet for all the time and that's how I got to, to work there. And I just remember going home just going, Mum, the guy's a maniac, brilliant vet, like absolutely awesome vet and phenomenal with people, but actually. I spent 4 years of Saturdays basically working on the reception, which counted as my, you know, seeing practise kind of thing to access, but did it give me a greater understanding of what goes on in the vets?

Probably to some degree, but not to, wow, you know, that's really opened my eyes. It's, you know, thinking back, I spent some time on reception. I wasn't really often in a concert room, I was primarily cleaning kennels.

If I saw I was watching an open abdomen, I had no idea what was going on, actually. To me, I think work experience behind a bar or behind a, in a supermarket is more valuable because what matters in what we do is how we communicate. So I think there's a place there and unfortunately there's still this school of thought.

That in order to get into vet school, you absolutely have to have spent your time cleaning kennels, cause that, above all, shows your determination and passion for veterinary medicine. And I refute that. I, I, I 100% agree.

Absolutely disagree with that, and I, and I've had conversations with people who, who don't understand the concept, you know, they'll say to me, well, anyone can get. A Saturday job in, in the practise. No, they can't.

Not nowadays you can't. Which which practise, you know, they have safeguarding issues they now need to consider. Unless you know someone who knows someone who knows someone, the likelihood of you getting a weekend job is tiny.

And you gain more. And I think I put yourself in a position to be a better vet, doing things like supermarket work. So, we need to reframe that.

Actually, COVID, if anything, has taught us that there's a really good virtual worlds that we could be using. And so, of course, you can't make up for the physical handling of animals or anything like that on work experience. But, for example, the Royal College of GPs have a virtual, work experience platform.

It's 3 days. 1 day of lectures, 1 day as you watch videos. So they hired actors.

And, you know, you see consults with, with doctors, with nurse practitioners, with receptionists, and it's done in a way that you see what's going on, but then there's speech bubbles that explain what they're thinking about. So, you get a real understanding of what it's like to be in a practise, and then you get one day in a practise. One day that's a structured day in a practise, you follow the relevant people.

I bet you if we had that sort of system in the veterinary profession, Three days would make do much more for learning than 2 years in a ken in a kennel. Definitely. I remember going, I, I must have been about 16 or 17, and I actually met some mates who are now also vets on this thing.

I'm sure it was called like Vett 6 or something like that. And it was at Nottingham Uni. It was long before Nottingham had a vet school, yeah, and, and, but it was like 3 o'clock in the morning one morning, you got woken up and taken out to Alamin, and you think like that was, that was cool, cos that actually gave you.

A focused, condensed window of time, and you know, those of you who are, are, are that way inclined in the profession, and I dare say, you know, can, can make things move, these are things to absolutely look at and say, look, you know, and it might be that as a, as a profession, we could go right, you know, for every kid who's paying for this, we're gonna give someone who doesn't have the same access, right, it's a free place, you know, things like that. But I'm gonna challenge you there. Should any of this be paid for?

Or actually, as a profession, you know, if, if we are genuinely talking about widening access, then we, as a profession, need to find the money from somewhere, and there is money floating about for this sort of thing to set up genuine widening participation schemes. Because those with contacts are not the ones that need the help. It's those without.

It's those without contacts, it's those that come from inner cities or rural locations where they don't have a farming background, because, you know, you do have disadvantaged rural communities as well. So, it is, there's a wider thing here. We need, and, and we need to have a system in place, or develop a system that is work experience, that is accessible and accepted by all vet schools.

That is in geographical location outside of the vicinity of vet schools, cos the other issue we have is vet schools have very good learning participation programmes that work around their individual locations. Cornwall, Outer Hebrides. But a large swathes of northern England.

No vet schools there. How do we, how do we reach those kids? So I think it is something that needs to be a concerted effort and the finances behind it as well.

Yeah, and I think that's something that. Like I say, for me is. There's so many people doing great things in the profession and I think, you know, you and I are great, we can have these conversations and we can say, you know, this is a problem, this is a problem, this is a possible solution, this is a possible solution.

But there's so many other people that have similar thought processes, and I for one would absolutely say, look, if you've got ideas on this, get in touch with us, get in touch with the BVA, get in, you know, don't sit on ideas because if it's something that you're passionate about, you know, just imagine being the, you know, the person that helps to shape the evolution of access to the veterinary profession. Like, what a great legacy to leave behind. I agree with you.

But if there's anyone out there listening that has the money to do something like this, I would urge them to get in touch because the reality is we've done this work. You know, we did our winning participation roundtable, we've, we've worked with the spires. We know.

What could work. The problem is funding. It's funding and buying and and.

The concern of fragmented attempts. So, you know, BVA, Beds, BV LGBT plus, spoon holders, we've all had these conversations, that sorts council with us, but ultimately, it's about money and desire. And we as a profession need to stop making excuses for where we're at, and making excuses like, but spending a every Saturday for 3 years in, in the kennels is vital to show you make a good vet and you have the termination nonsense.

I was gonna say something else just as well like that. It's alright, we can, we can, we can edit in a beep, but it's total nonsense, and so, yeah, I mean. It's complex, it's not straightforward.

We still have a profession that thinks we are elite in some way, and we're not. We're just ordinary people. We still have a profession that perpetuates this thought process that you have to be elite in order to get into it.

Nonsense. But we also have challenges that there are systemic problems that we need to consider how we can help get over them. Yeah, and I think also, I think something that I'm always keen to point out is that some of the best vets I know are still from the elite.

You know, I, I don't think there's, there's something to, to hide that and I think people, as you said earlier, people sometimes think you're having a go at them for being privileged. There's absolutely no shame in that. But I think being privileged gives you a massive opportunity to help others who are not as privileged.

And it's hard because. Your experiences are different, and sometimes you just cannot relate to the problems. Like for me, I was so blessed that my mum and dad would drop everything.

I mean they, they must have been, there were 3, there's 3, well there were, there still are 3 of us, and they must have been like passing ships in a night for the best part of a decade. Because of taking me to one place, taking my sister to another place, then taking my brother elsewhere, then picking us up, and you think, you know, that is a blessed problem to have. And yet, you know, there's people who, you know, getting engagement from their parents for them is, is the biggest challenge of their daily existence.

So, I would actively encourage anyone to take any opportunity to speak to anyone you have any exposure to. About the profession, and to engage with organisations like the BVA, like the webinar vets, like any anybody who has got any sway in this profession, and in 10 years' time, wouldn't it be great if we could turn around and go, oh my God, look at, look at the profession now, you know. And I, I think it's really important to reiterate what you've said.

I am not, I'm not attacking nor criticising those that have had a private education, for example, or those that come from a, a whole, you know, stream of veterinary surgeons, for example. What I am saying is that it shouldn't be a profession that completely excludes the others. The others should have the opportunity to consider this as a profession for them, and at least put in an application.

If they then put in an application and they don't get through, well, actually, that's different. But we have a system that means many people won't even put that application in, and that is a problem. That is not the way that we increase diversity.

And we all bring different skill sets, you know. I think we all have to acknowledge that our different backgrounds is a positive thing, particularly when it comes to engaging with clients, for example. You know, I, I like to think I'm a good communicator, but I would suspect that my communication with people, you know, from South London, that when I'm not speaking like this, speak like I would normally speak, actually, me as their vet would probably engage them more in there.

In their, pet's healthcare, for example. So, just because it's, you're right, it's not a criticism on those that are publicly educated. You know, if you, if you've got those opportunities, take them, grab them with both hands.

But we as a profession need to acknowledge that not everyone does. And if you keep banging the same drum, you get the same tune. Yeah, yeah, and I think, you know, it's, it's a monumental task, and I think, you know, it's, it's sometimes tasks like these, you know, this is, There is this picture of a vet that society has, which is blonde haired, full head of hair, chap, middle ages, check shirt, chinos.

And, and that is, you know, when you speak to everybody, and I know when I speak to people they say, oh God, you're a better type, but you're scouse. I sit there thinking like, oh dude, ouch. But the interesting fact is that it's probably not actually the demographic of our profession anymore.

Absolutely, like, you know, female. Yeah. And, and, and actually, you know, you look at it now and I go to them, well, actually, I, I, in, in the 20 practises that I work in, you know.

I'm probably one of about 10 blokes across all of those practises. But interestingly, and, and this is probably one for us down the line, in, in ownership, obviously there's the corporate change, but there is still this huge swathe, and I'm noticing more and more female owners of practises and female founders of practises, but until recently there'd been this massive bias towards male. Middle aged owners of practises, and it, it shows that we can change because now, you're seeing this new generation of practises coming that are founded by women, that have been bought by women, that are run completely by women, and I think, you know, there's this real interesting, we, we've seen change adopted by the practise and embraced by the profession, and to me that shows that.

We're not a profession that is incapable of change. COVID shows you that. In a slightly more succinct fashion.

But, but yeah, like, to me that shows that actually changing access to the profession is not impossible. No, it's not. But you've highlighted two, I mean, there might be things for different, days, but.

The, the, the gender thing about women and, the, the change in practise ownership. There is still a lack of gender equality in the profession. And that's where we're, we're having issues.

You know, there's good, and, and I think gender equality and diversity is something else that we should touch on, a different one. But it comes back to role models. The core of this is what you're talking about as role models.

Now, if we just step back a second and look at the, and just think about the television, and I'm not gonna name programmes. If you look at the television and TV programmes that are directly involved in vets, And, and I, I, I'm generalising here, but overwhelmingly, the middle-aged white men that are the main people involved, you know, in my mind, I am thinking of three main programmes, one based in the North, one based in the south, and one based all over the country. North and South-based practises, overwhelmingly white, middle-aged men, and certainly their main character, I say characters, they're people, but their main veterinary surgeon involved is a white middle-aged man.

This other programme has got a better spread. It's almost 50, there's an odd number of them. But it's almost 50/50 in terms of gender, and it has ethnic diversity as well.

If you're a kid looking up, let's say you are, I don't know. A black boy or a young girl from a traveller community, you look up and none of them look like you. None of them.

None of them have your background. Therefore, there's no role modelling there. But on top of that, you probably go to a school that educationally gatekeeps you and says, Well, no, no, you're not clever enough, you're not elite enough.

You can't do science. You don't have a background that provides you with the science capital. You're doomed to fail before you start.

And that is wrong. Now, there'll be people listening that go, Identity politics is all nonsense, if you're good enough to be a vet, you'll get there. No, what we need to acknowledge is that it's the barriers that we put in place that are the problem, because that person never gets the chance to prove they're good enough, and that is the issue.

Yeah, and I think that to me and and it's interesting looking at the, the programmes over the the years. And I think vets in practise and vet school had, you know, there was, there was a good mix of, of blokes and and and and girls on it. And at the same time.

I look at, you know, that, that sort of traditional vet role model of James Harriet, that, you know. Yeah. That, that is, you know, when people talk about vets, you know, I have, I have mates that, you know, have got me in their phone as Ben Vittenary, you know, and, and things like that, and, and you think, you know, actually, these have been drilled into people's expectations of what a vet is for 30, 40 years.

Yeah, yeah. You know, like that, that is, it's ingrained. It's ingrained in society as far as even educational establishments.

So teachers in secondary and primary schools see this as being a vet. When you're presenting with a kid that doesn't fit that, they go, Oh, no, no, no. Too hard.

Off you go, let's go a different way. So who does the responsibility lie with to say, right, OK. This is what we do.

Everyone. It's such a, and, and this is, and this is the thing. When we talk about diversity and inclusion, to me, inclusion is the easiest bit to fix, right?

The diversity aspect is the harder bit, because it is so complex. It comes from our ingrained, our ingrained thought processes that we're probably not even aware of. It comes from, and, and I think if I step back, if, if I step back, I have my biases as well, and sometimes they come out, and I have to really check myself.

And so, we all have our ingrained thought processes on what makes a good vet, what doesn't, what background makes a good vet. We then have the systemic problems of Educational gatekeeping, lack of science capital, we have the barriers to entry to vet schools, such as work experience and so on, and so, I don't think your answer is, we, there's one individual person. I think we as a profession need to stop.

We need to stop with this perception that we are some kind of elite. We're not. We're just people doing a job that we enjoy doing.

And we need, and we need to stop telling kids, you'll never make it. It's too hard, it's terrible. We, we need to stop that.

We, I believe, as so the educational gatekeeping, the problems with systemic education is perhaps slightly out of our reach. You know, short of lobbying and things like that, which BVA does do educational lobbying. That, that needs a whole massive sort of, Change.

And, and that isn't within any of our remits. What is within our remits, however, is to work together to set out an outreach programme that works. Not one where you drop into a, into a classroom and walk out and never come back again.

It has to be a sustained outreach project with various touch points along the way to keep these kids going. But that needs funding, and in a way, it also needs egos to be dropped, which sounds very controversial. But it needs, it needs everyone to come together.

Sounds a bit like COVID again. But it needs everyone to come together and to work together for a solution. Because if we keep doing these tiny little programmes here, there and everywhere, there's no coherent structure.

There's no long term sustainable change, and we're missing kids all along the way. So I think we have a duty to talk about our profession in a positive light. To encourage kids to stop thinking we're the be all and end all, we're not.

We're vets. We put fingers up, dog's bottoms and hands up cow's bums, you know, let's. And if you're doing it the other way round, I would suggest that you really take some, some guidance in your in your clinical exams with patients.

Yeah. And, and actually, you know, I guess my plea here would be if there is anyone listening. That thinks, do you know what?

I have the systems in place to help with this, or I have the funding, more importantly, because I think that's part of it, you know, that could help with this. I would urge them to get in touch. I have the answers as to what the problems are and what could work.

The answers I don't have is how we get it out there, because it involves such a big collaboration. And I'm happy to be the broker of conversations. So, if anyone's listening and they think they have the technological or the clinical idea to make a sustainable long-term change, or the funding, get in touch.

I think, you know, let, let's start something. So, yes, we all need to be involved, but we need to be involved together. Yeah, and it's interesting, isn't it, cos like you know we talk about every practise now is switched on, or at least I hope most practises are switched on to client engagement.

But as a profession, we absolutely have to be switched on. To the next generation engagements, which means, you know, in the same way that we send our clients reminders for their flea and wormers and reminders for their flu vaccines, their flu vaccines, you can, you can tell that I've been watching far too much vaccination at the moment with COVID. So you know, reminders for their vaccinations, remind us for XYZ to keep them engaged with us as a practise.

So my challenge to you is to broaden that, to widen your gaze, and to say, right, let's do this bigger and broader to the youth and say, and do you know what, actually, maybe it's not even to the youth, maybe it's the people who are in their early 20s who haven't even considered veterinary practise and go, do you know what guys, actually you could do this. Yeah. But as Daniella rightly says, and I think it is the perfect point to end on.

We have a responsibility, whether we like it or not, to our profession, because actually, if, if we don't engage with it and we don't involve, it's distinctly possible that there may be no profession in years ahead and it might just become something else that is swallowed up by the evolution of, of sort of, you know, the industrial world and becomes just another industry. And I think just to add on that before we finish, two things, there will be people listening. That will be thinking, this is nonsense, if we do this, capable people are gonna miss out on places cos there's increased competition.

My thought back to them, there's already capable kids missing out because they don't even consider this professional something for them. Secondly, the why. To me and to you, the answer here is, it's the right thing to do to facilitate more people to come into the profession.

For those hard-nosed people amongst you who don't want to accept the moral reason for it, if you want to make a business reason, there is very good evidence out there that diverse teams result in better outcomes. So if we want a good future for our profession, We can improve it with a more diverse team, and the only way we do that is by encouraging kids from diverse backgrounds to enter our profession. And I think for me one of the greatest pieces of evidence for that is that I became a vet.

Because of my touch points with veterinary professionals as a kid. Like John Adams and and a vet called Nicola Southern, who were fundamental. I actually found the letter that Nicola wrote as a piece of supporting literature for me to get into vet school.

I found that when I moved house recently and it it very much sort of made me reflective and and as you do you I actually got a bit choked up at the time, but. The engagement of those vets in my personal journey has stuck with me and will stick with me for my entire professional journey. So my challenge to you as individuals would be, wouldn't it be great?

Even in 2030, 40 years' time, there's some adult who's turning around going, do you remember such and such? I became a vet cos of him, or I became a vet cos of her, or I became a vet cos of them. And actually, That, that just, that sits nicely to me.

So yeah, I think that's the perfect point to end on. Daniela, as always, thank you. I'm aware that we're brilliant at keeping to our sort of 20 minute time frame for, for our conversations.

Those of you that have complaints about our ramblings, please do send them in, sorry, but you don't have control over how long our episodes are at the webinart.com. So yeah, we shall be doing several episodes on this.

Looking at the various different aspects of people's journey into veterinary medicine, science, life. The next one we're gonna look at is the, the sort of, the, the diversity and, and the sort of challenges that go with that student life, and then we'll move on from there. I'm fairly sure you can follow the pattern from that point.

But yeah, Daniella, as always, thank you. And yeah, the next one will be coming soon.