Veterinary students from across the country will be in the Volunteer State for a weekend of learning, networking, and fun in March. The Student American Veterinary Medical Association (SAVMA) chapters at the UT College of Veterinary Medicine (UTCVM) and LMU College of Veterinary Medicine are co-hosting the national 2024 SAVMA Symposium March 14 – 17. The symposium will be held at both veterinary colleges as well as the Knoxville Convention Center. This is the second time UTCVM has hosted the event. The first was twenty years ago in 2004.

The symposium, which is planned solely by veterinary students, will include over fifty lectures, twenty wet labs, and social events for 700-plus students including trips to Dollywood, Zoo Knoxville, Tennessee Aquarium, and Cumberland Gap National Park. Lectures will cover the many facets of the veterinary profession including but not limited to public health, animal welfare, antimicrobial stewardship, communication skills, bovine nutrition, black bear medicine and rehabilitation, and equine dentistry. Veterinary students can also compete in bovine palpation, suturing skills, and anatomy identification.

SAVMA was created in 1969 as the national organization for veterinary students, in order to foster communication between individual chapters at veterinary schools. It exists to support, empower, and inspire all veterinary students in improving their lives, education, and career, along with securing a better future for the profession through collaboration with its parent organization, the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA).