Towards a humane veterinary education

There is a vast array of learning tools and approaches to veterinary education, many tried and true, many innovative and with potential. Such new methods have come about partly from an increasing demand from both students and teachers to avoid methods of teaching and training that harm animals. The aim is to create the best quality education, ideally supported by validation of the efficacy of particular educational tools and approaches, while ensuring that animals are not used harmfully and that respect for animal life is engendered within the student. In this paper, we review tools and approaches that can be used in the teaching of veterinary students, tools and approaches that ensure the dignity and humane treatment of animals that all teachers and students must observe as the very ethos of the veterinary profession that they serve. Veterinary education has not always met, and still often does not meet, this essential criterion.