Winner, Experiences
Michelle Sanborn, writing as FARM Club Publicity Commissioner, UC Davis

In California, not many veterinary students are interested in a career in food animal medicine. Most students have very little food animal experience; many have never been to an actual farm or handled a large animal. The Food Animal and Reproduction Medicine (FARM) Club at UC Davis is the club that encompasses students with bovine, small ruminant, and swine interests. UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine has about 130 students in each class. Each of the students must pick a species interest, which allows the student to focus their education in their 3^rd and 4^th year. There is an average of 3 students per year that track solely food animal medicine, though there are others who choose mixed animal. Even with the small number of students tracking food animal medicine each year, our club has many student members who are interested in learning more about food animals. We have a tight network with UC Davis students, California, agricultural organizations, food animal veterinary organizations, and local media and community that have led us to a huge victory for our small club. We would love to share our story with other veterinary students.

When we heard about the BCF Ultrasound Competition for veterinary student organizations, the FARM Club Officers were apprehensive. None of us felt like we were creative enough or had enough time to do a good job to be able to compete. But we signed up even though we thought it was a long shot, because this was an amazing opportunity for our club, and winning our own portable ultrasound machine seemed like an incredible goal. Christy Copeland and Rachael Lyons (Co-President-Elects), Sara Steidl (President) and I (Publicity Chair) sat down one evening to brainstorm our video. The video was supposed to show our enthusiasm, so we wanted to do something interesting and different, something that would make us stand out. We thought of our favorite videos that make us smile, and we couldn’t help but think of music videos. We bounced from Britney Spears in a plaid skirt to Katy Perry in a blue wig, among many others. How did we picture ourselves? As the only organization from California entered in the contest, we chose Katy Perry’s “California Gurls” song. We’re from California, happy cows are from California; it just made sense. It took four of us dancing through our school hallways and singing the song over and over to re-write all the lyrics and start choreographing and planning our scenes.

We filmed the music video at the school one day and at the dairy another. We were able to get about 15 of our club members to join us, and we were excited about the enthusiasm. The song became infectious; we couldn’t stop singing it and every time we played it we just had to dance around. Enthusiasm being one of the judging criteria, we started to think maybe we had a shot at winning this competition. Not everyone who came out to help us had experience around cattle, and none of us had experience shooting a music video. We had a lot of ideas, and filmed many segments, but were still not quite sure how it would all come together. Our favorite shots were the ones at the dairy when the cows walked in the middle and nudged our members. “COW-lifornia girls we’re unforgettable, coveralls with cow poop on top!” was our favorite line of the song, and by the end of the shoot, it was the truth. We stopped filming three times because the tractor was driving by, we were whistled at twice, and once a man on a golf cart giving a kid a tour stopped and told us we were doing a great job selling the school to the new recruits. One of our IT professionals helped us put the movie together, and when we heard the voices with the music and put the video clips in, we were thrilled. It was better than anything we had envisioned, and we were really proud of ourselves.

Having submitted our article about “A non-reproductive use of ultrasound” as well as our music video the night before it was due, we crossed our fingers that the judges would like our article and that our photo would get ‘likes’ on Facebook.  Ultimately with the second highest ‘likes’ of any photo, we made it to the top 8 entries which meant our video was released to the world for popular votes.  We couldn’t believe we had a shot at winning. This ultrasound machine would mean so many educational opportunities for our club members!

We watched all the other videos and were impressed with all of the entries. Each school took a different angle, and it ranged from educational to creative. We knew that in the face of such tough competition we would have to start a strong marketing campaign in order to win! We started marketing the last few days of spring break, beginning with e-mails, posts to Facebook pages, shares on other peoples’ pages, and ads on our Club Facebook page. We proceeded to send out school-wide announcements. We were excited when our message started to get out in wider and wider circles. Our video was posted on the Facebook Page of UC Davis School of Vet Med, then UC Davis School of Law, and made it all the way to the main UC Davis Facebook page. Many of our club members and classmates shared our video on their own personal Facebook pages and helped spread the word. A personal email to UCD SVM Dean Lairmore resulted in him immediately tweeting it. We had made it onto a whole new level of social media, and we were ecstatic.

As we worked on publicity, our message got out to the California Veterinary Medical Association (CVMA) and News10 ABC Facebook pages, where they reposted it for all their fans to view. We were also supported by a variety of agricultural organizations, such as California Women for Agriculture and California 4H. A local country radio station put it on their web page of community events. Our posts began to circulate through the community, and we were able to reach a surprisingly wide audience.

The FARM Club contacted various newspapers, radio stations, and television news stations to help us connect with the local community. We were pleasantly surprised with how simple it was to set up a TV interview. We had a fun, interesting, “feel-good” story and the media wanted to share it. We e-mailed, wrote letters, and sent Facebook messages to a variety of media outlets, and started to hear back quickly. Our story was quickly published in local newspapers and newsletters.

Soon we were invited on to Good Day Sacramento, a local morning talk show. We got a filming set up at the UC Davis Dairy! It was truly a surreal experience. We were asked to all wear our “cute outfits,” meaning coveralls, and we quickly made friends with the media officers of UC Davis School of Vet Med and the UC Davis Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital (VMTH). The reporter from Good Day Sacramento showed up at the UC Davis Dairy wearing 5 inch strappy coral heels. We showed her the pasture with the cows, and she quickly asked for my extra pair of boots. We asked the photographer, Paul, if he was okay with coming in the pasture with the cows and if it was okay if they licked his equipment to which he replied, “I’ve waited my whole career for this moment,” and hopped the fence. The cows would not leave Paul and the camera and tripod alone. We were excited when it aired on the CBS Evening News and Good Day Sacramento, and were proud the segment turned out well!

On April 1^st, Dr. Varga, our faculty advisor, sent us an e-mail 20 minutes before an exam saying we had won the competition. With the support of our students, school, and community the FARM Club at UC Davis was able to generate about 2,000 votes for our video, out of a total of 6,000 votes for the 8 university entries. Since we found out we won, we have had a lot of support from a surprising number of people, including people I’d never met who have stopped me to tell me they voted for our video. We did a radio interview about the contest and the FARM Club that aired on several popular radio stations. We wrote a press release that was distributed to local media outlets. Several local newspapers have done follow-up stories on the FARM Club, and we did an in-studio follow-up interview with Good Day Sacramento.

We wrote over 30 thank you letters to organizations that supported us in our journey, and have started to hear back already. One newspaper published our letter in the “Letters to the Editor” section. A local agriculture organization is having our club come speak at their state event next month. The radio show has invited us back to discuss future agriculture issues from a veterinary perspective. Some of the cattle organizations that supported us are going to help us set up future wet labs to use our new ultrasound machine.

The FARM Club at UC Davis exists to provide extracurricular learning and networking opportunities for students interested in food animal production medicine. We believe in providing utmost care for animals, while working to ensure a healthy, wholesome and safe food supply to benefit the world. We have the unique responsibility to bring sound scientific evidence to our future clients and to educate the consuming public about the food they eat. This mission begins in school and continues throughout our careers as future food animal practitioners.

We encourage all veterinary school clubs to make these connections with their community. The resources that are at our fingertips are unlimited. The veterinary profession is one of the most respected professions, and community members are happy to come together to support veterinary schools and students. We would like to acknowledge our competitors who made this competition fun and interesting, and wish you all the best of luck in the future. We hope that activities like these can help foster relationships between future food animal veterinarians across the country, because our profession can benefit from collaboration.

The FARM Club is proud that our dedication, teamwork, enthusiasm, and community involvement led us to win the BCF Technology Easi-Scan Ultrasound Machine. The connections we have made, and the ultrasound machine from BCF, will provide invaluable experiences for our members.  Thank you to our actors, singers, and videographers that helped make our video a winner. Thank you to everyone who helped promote our video and who voted for us. Thank you to BCF for hosting this competition. We appreciate everyone who helped make our dream a reality.

For more information about the FARM Club at UC Davis, or to watch our video entry, please visit the FARM Club at UC Davis website or Facebook page. Additional background about the BCF University Competition can be found on the BCF Technology website.

Author: Michelle Sanborn, FARM Club Publicity Commissioner and second year veterinary student at UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine

http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/Clubs/farm/

https://www.facebook.com/FarmClubAtUCDavis

https://www.facebook.com/UCDavisLivestockMedicineSurgeryService

http://www.northamerica.bcftechnology.com/blog/2013/april/uc-davis-farm-club-wins-an-easi-scan