You don’t need to spend four to eight years or more in school so you can work with animals. Instead, you might want to consider a trade program that gives you practical information you’ll be able to use almost immediately.
You’ll learn how to interact with others who are either in or planning to enter animal science. You’ll learn how to think critically. You’ll be able to work on coursework that will keep you interested. In the classroom, you’ll be interacting with your instructor and fellow students and working on in-depth research and analysis of animal science issues.
What kinds of careers can you move into? You might consider becoming a zookeeper, animal scientist, or even a breeding technician. You could work as a livestock auctioneer or manager, become a farmer and work with animals on someone’s farm or your own farm with a focus on agricultural science, or you might wish to become an educator in the field.
Or, if you have plans to go to college for a few more years, becoming an animal geneticist may be a good option. If you decide to really devote some time to your education, you could still go on to become a veterinarian.
What Do Workers in Animal Science Do?
After completing your trade or training program, a variety of career options await, depending on your interests. You could pursue a career in science and technology, working in areas such as nutrition, health, disease control, animal behavior, research, genetics, animal breeding, or other specialized fields.
If you're interested in veterinary medicine, an animal sciences degree can lead to a career as a veterinary technician, which requires less time than becoming a veterinarian. With experience, your options expand, including working with large or small animals, in public health, food safety, research, inspections, or preventive medicine.
If you go into food safety, research, public health, or inspections, you could find work with local, state, or federal government agencies. These include the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Health and Human Services.
Where Do Graduates Work?
- Conservation Officer:
In this position, you’ll work out in the wild to protect animals. By doing this, you also protect the environment as the two are inextricably linked. As a conservation officer, you’ll help to protect and improve areas that are environmentally important, which allows animals large and small to thrive. - Food Industry:
Choosing to work in the food industry may mean earning secondary degrees after you complete your degree in animal sciences, but that all depends on your interest in moving up in the field. You may help identify and research animal health in this arena and make sure that farms are run with public health in mind. This work helps to improve the health and wellness of consumers and ensure compliance with local and federal rules. With your animal sciences background, you’ll able to offer more value in this field. - Veterinary Technician:
Here, you’ll earn a degree that will allow you to assist full veterinarians. You may take courses that focus on animal anatomy, physiology, biology, zoology, chemistry, or microbiology. The human parents of pets you see will be grateful for your expertise when the time comes for them to visit the vet.
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Why Get Into this Field?
As an animal science student, you'll learn about the body systems of both captive and domestic animals and how they are used by humans, such as livestock. Your education will emphasize humane, modern animal care. Afterward, you may choose to continue your studies in animal husbandry or seek work in animal shelters, caring for lost or surrendered pets.
Completing either a training or trade program in animal science gives you a good foundation for earning a bachelor’s and master’s in animal science. Whether you decide to go into animal dentistry or focus more on laboratory animal science, your education and internships will give you an invaluable background no matter where you end up.
How to Become an Animal Services Worker
GED or High School Diploma
If you know early on that you’re interested in working with animals, you’ll want to fill your high school class schedule as much as possible with sciences, math classes, computer science, English, environmental earth science, calculus, trigonometry, and statistics. If you plan to keep going to school beyond your animal science trade school, this will help you to get into universities more easily.
Depending on where you are hoping to earn your trade or vocational education, you may only need a high school diploma or GED to attend. However, some schools are slightly more exclusive and require that you have maintained a certain GPA in high school or that you take and pass the ACT or SAT standardized tests. These programs will have their own requirements in terms of what constitutes a passing score, so you should find 1-3 programs you are interested in attending and find their requirements as soon as possible.
Animal Science Training and Other Certification
- Zoo & Aquarium Science:
If you plan to become an aquarist or zookeeper, this certificate will fit perfectly into your career plans. You’ll be able to begin working with primates, marine mammals, carnivores, and other exotic wildlife. - Animal Care, Equine, and Land Based:
By opting for a course that covers animal care, equine, and land-based industries, you’ll be able to apply for hundreds of opportunities. You may plan to work as a park ranger or in a veterinary practice in the country. - Equine Science:
These professional development programs offer you both instruction and practical experience in the nutrition, management, physiology, and care of horses. - Animal Assisted Therapy:
Earning this certificate means you’ll be able to share your love of animals with others and show them how the relationships between humans and animals can enrich their lives. It can also help those who need interactions with animals who won’t judge. This certificate teaches you about animal-assisted therapy, education, and activities. - HNC Animal Management:
This Higher National Certificate gives you a good basis for working with animals. You’ll be prepared for employment in a supervisory-level position if you earn this along with your animal sciences degree. - Animal Science Fundamentals:
In this type of certificate program, you’ll learn basic knowledge in the fundamentals of animal science. This may allow you to obtain entry-level employment in agricultural sales and services, on ranges, and on farms. This is one of the first steps toward a career as an educator in agricultural science as well. - Animal Care & Management:
Earning this certificate means you’ll be able to enter a career path in the veterinary care of domesticated animals (pets). You’ll spend time interning at veterinary clinics or animal hospitals. A part of your internship prepares you to work in a vet clinic, using and caring for the instruments, learning how to sterilize them, and how to analyze both blood and urine samples.
Find Online Programs for Animal Science
Continuing Education for Animal Science Graduates
If you plan to become an animal behaviorist or veterinarian, you’ll need to pursue a four-year degree and possibly higher degrees (master’s or doctorate in veterinary medicine). A good option is to earn a bachelor’s degree focusing on domestic animals like cats, dogs, and farm animals such as cows, pigs, and sheep. This also includes draft animals like horses and donkeys, though camels are rare in the U.S. unless you work at a petting zoo.
You may also consider earning a certificate in applied animal behavior. This program helps you to learn and understand the behaviors that some animals display so you can care for them and help to improve their quality of life and even their health. Consider cats - we know they hide when they are hurt or feeling sick. This is an instinctive behavior that helps them to protect themselves from predators and may help you explain to a worried pet owner why they might be acting strange and what they can do to help their pet.
Salary and Job Outlook
A veterinary technologist or technician’s average salary is $43,740. Dog trainers earn $30,180 in their early careers. And those in the top 10% of earners make around $59,300. If you enjoy working and spending a lot of time with dogs, this may be a position for you to consider. This job role is projected to grow by 19% between 2023 and 2033, which is much faster than average.
Animal Care and Service workers earn around $25,000 annually ($12.02/hour). If you are interested in this type of position, you can expect to receive on-the-job training once you’re hired. You’re likely to work in one of a variety of places where animals are housed or cared for such as zoos, kennels, veterinary clinics, animal shelters, stables, pet stores, and aquariums. You must be ready to work hard physically. The work an animal care service worker does can be demanding. And, if you get attached to one or more of the animals, you may find the work can be emotionally demanding, especially if they get sick, go into an adoptive placement, or die.
Animal trainers work with and train various breeds of animals. The work they do may teach horses how to accept a harness and carry riders. Or you may train animals for obedience, security, and performance. This position holds a mean annual wage of $36,000, but that may be higher if you work with large aquatic animals (dolphins or orcas) or if you find yourself working on movie sets with trained animals.
Requirements
In high school, it's important to take and grasp chemistry, biology, and physics, especially if you plan to pursue a graduate degree. Performing well in these subjects will help you succeed in higher-level courses in trade or training programs, and instructors will appreciate your advanced understanding of these sciences.
Vocational training may also help you to determine just what kind of work you want to do with animals. By completing this level of education, you’ll develop your knowledge of the various fields available and may even get a chance to intern in whichever field you think holds the most interest for you. Maybe you’ll have the chance to work at a farm and decide that this is the career you’ve always wanted, or perhaps you’ll decide that, while you like farm animals, it may really be worth it to complete a higher level of education and become a farm vet.
Necessary Skills
Along with working with animals, you have to be ready and willing to spend time working with a variety of other people. You need to be able to communicate with them effectively and efficiently, even when in the midst of an emergency. When working with animals, whether on a farm or in a vet’s office, you also need to communicate and express empathy to the owners of the animals you’ll be working with. This makes communication one of the top skills you must have.
- Communication:
Listen more than you speak—your clients will have important things about their pets to tell you. You’ll discuss with the vet what they told you and what it might mean in terms of a diagnosis, so you should be accurate. You’ll also take phone calls, give animal care information, and schedule appointments. - Work independently:
You shouldn’t need supervision to do most of your job. You must be willing to work independently when you are caring for an animal, whether that is during a short visit or when animals are kept overnight for observation and care. - Time management:
Staying “on time” during a hectic day is incredibly important in a business where people expect to be seen on a schedule. If all of your tasks are equally important, you’ll need to be able to work with the entire veterinary team and get things done by helping each other and staying on task yourself. - Observation:
It’s important when you work as intake for your animal patients that you be able to observe the animal and their owner, gather information from what you see as well as what you’re told, and be able to note anything important in a chart or share it with the vet. - Technical skills:
You’ll need to be comfortable with lab equipment and technical machinery used by a practice – you might be helping with urinalysis, disinfection, blood work, and sterilization of surgical instruments. -
Written communication:
You’ll need to write effectively and efficiently so your veterinarian and other staff members know what you are saying.
Similar Careers
If you want to do work with animals at a higher level, then earning a four-year bachelor’s degree allows you to work as either a zoologist or wildlife biologist; or you can earn a master’s degree and work as a veterinarian.
Another alternative to animal science is working as a veterinary assistant or laboratory animal caretaker. The median annual salary for these positions is $29,000. You’ll need a high school diploma or GED to work in this field and you’ll have on-the-job training. Your days will consist of routine animal care and you’ll likely also help the veterinarians and others with their daily work.
If you grew up on a farm and the work is familiar to you, you may only need a high school diploma or GED and five years of work experience in a similar occupation to find a position as an agriculture worker. You could help care for livestock and work with the products they produce. On-the-job training is sufficient for this position. You don’t necessarily need a high school diploma but it can help. The median annual pay for this position is $26,000.