Magíster en Ciencias Animales y Veterinarias postgraduate personal statement example

Personal statement example

The McMaster slide holds two small chambers, and for most of one autumn I counted the strongyle eggs inside them for my undergraduate thesis. I was comparing faecal egg counts with FAMACHA eyelid scores in ewes on two smallholdings near Osorno. I wanted to know whether farmers could use the eyelid chart to decide which animals needed deworming, rather than treating the whole flock. I would like to pursue a master's degree in animal and veterinary sciences so that I can study questions like this with better design and stronger analysis.

The project was modest. I sampled sixty ewes on three visits and recorded body condition, FAMACHA score and egg counts per gram. On one farm, high egg counts matched pale eyelids reasonably well, which made sense because Haemonchus contortus causes anaemia. On the other farm, several ewes with high counts looked perfectly healthy. When I identified larvae from pooled cultures, that farm had a larger share of Trichostrongylus, which damages the gut but causes little blood loss. My supervisor helped me understand that the scoring system was doing what it was designed to do. The problem was my assumption that a single tool would work everywhere. Writing the discussion taught me to separate what my data showed from what I hoped it would show. It also made me curious about anthelmintic resistance. Neither farmer had ever run a faecal egg count reduction test, and both had used the same drug class for years.

Since graduating I have worked at a mixed-practice clinic. I assist with consultations, take blood samples, run in-house haematology and staff the reception desk where farmers drop off samples for external laboratories. That last task is more useful than it sounds. I label and log samples, and I have learned how much good results depend on the plain steps that come first: refrigeration, clear identification and an honest history from the owner. When a submission is poor, I now explain why we need a fresh sample instead of just asking for one, and repeat submissions have become noticeably better organised. I also handle routine calls from sheep and cattle clients, so I hear how decisions on parasite control are actually made on farms. Cost, labour and the weather often matter more than the textbook recommendation.

To prepare for postgraduate study, I have been improving my statistics. I worked through an online course in R and reanalysed my thesis data using mixed models with the animal as a random effect. My original analysis had ignored the fact that the same ewes were measured repeatedly, and correcting it changed some of my confidence intervals. I have also been reading about targeted selective treatment and the refugia concept. The idea is to leave part of a parasite population unexposed to drugs in order to slow resistance. I want to understand how that principle can be adapted to small southern Chilean flocks with limited labour.

Outside work, I coach a junior rowing group at a club on the Río Rahue on Saturday mornings. Organising twelve teenagers, two boats and changeable weather has made me calm about plans that need adjusting at short notice, which also happens on farm visits. I read a lot of Chilean history and keep a small vegetable garden that mostly feeds the slugs.

I hope a master's degree will give me rigorous training in experimental design, epidemiology and laboratory methods. My aim is to work on applied research in livestock health that farmers can actually use. I bring field experience, practical clinic skills and a clear sense of the questions I want to ask, and I am ready to learn the methods to answer them properly.