Ohio State veterinary college signals growth and next-phase planning
Bottom line
CURRENT BRIEF VERSION: Ohio State’s College of Veterinary Medicine used its 2026 State of the College address on March 24 to frame the past decade as a period of growth, while signaling that the next phase will focus on financial sustainability, facility upgrades, curriculum evolution, and technology adoption. According to the college’s strategic plan, DVM applications have grown to more than 2,650 for 165 seats, endowment principal rose from $25 million in 2015 to $105 million, and the college has held tuition increases to no more than 2% for seven years. Recent and planned investments also point to that growth strategy, including the Veterinary Medical Center’s new linear accelerator, which reopened radiation oncology in January 2024, and a March 5, 2026, Ohio State Board of Trustees action advancing a $4.5 million veterinary library redesign project. The address also highlighted continued work around AI integration and curriculum redesign, building on Ohio State’s competency-based DVM curriculum launched with the class of 2026 in fall 2022. Winter 2026 college updates also show that growth is extending into public-health and field-service capacity: the Department of Veterinary Preventive Medicine said it is using National Animal Disease Preparedness and Response Program support to work with producers on biosecurity, livestock-market risk reduction, and outreach to small farms amid concerns tied to highly pathogenic avian influenza, while Large Animal Services at Marysville added dairy- and equine-focused veterinarian Aaron Pospisil, DVM ’17. (vet.osu.edu)
Why it matters: For veterinary professionals, this is less about one speech and more about how a major college is positioning itself for workforce and practice needs. Ohio State is already tying education reform to clinical readiness, and separately has said it plans to grow class size from 165 to 200 over time through its Protect OHIO initiative to address rural and large-animal shortages. The winter department update adds another layer: Protect OHIO is also being linked to disease preparedness, producer outreach, and One Health work, including the 2025 appointment of Amanda Berrian, DVM, MPH, PhD, DACVPM, as the inaugural Dr. Tom Mack Chair for Global One Health. Together, that makes the State of the College address a useful signal of where one influential program sees the profession heading: more pressure on sustainable finances, more emphasis on outcomes-based training, and more investment in infrastructure and outreach that support specialty care, food-animal practice, research, and referral relationships. (vet.osu.edu)
What to watch: Watch for how quickly Ohio State turns its strategic priorities into visible changes in class size, facilities, AI-supported teaching, and field-facing programs tied to biosecurity, large-animal service, and One Health over the rest of 2026. (vet.osu.edu)
CURRENT FULL VERSION: Ohio State’s College of Veterinary Medicine used its March 24, 2026, State of the College address to make a clear case: the college sees itself in a growth phase, but one that now has to be translated into long-term resilience. The themes highlighted in source material — financial sustainability, expansion in clinical and diagnostic programs, facility investment, leadership transitions, AI integration, and curriculum redesign — fit closely with the college’s broader strategic plan and recent university actions. (vet.osu.edu)
That framing builds on several years of visible change. Ohio State launched its competency-based DVM curriculum with the class of 2026 in fall 2022, aiming to integrate hands-on learning earlier and more consistently across the four-year program. A 2025 college update said the class of 2026 would be the first to experience the curriculum’s full scope as it entered clinics, underscoring that the redesign is still being operationalized rather than treated as finished work. (vet.osu.edu)
The college’s own strategic plan helps explain why leadership is emphasizing momentum and preparation at the same time. It says applications have doubled to more than 2,650 for 165 seats, describes the Veterinary Medical Center as the only academic tertiary hospital across Ohio, West Virginia, and Kentucky, and lists operational metrics such as philanthropy, student debt, and Veterinary Health System margin among the measures it will use to judge success. The same plan says endowment principal quadrupled from $25 million in 2015 to $105 million, while tuition increases were held to no more than 2% over the past seven years. (vet.osu.edu)
On facilities, the recent record supports the growth narrative. The Veterinary Medical Center reported that its new linear accelerator allowed radiation oncology services to reopen in January 2024, expanding cancer treatment capability. More recently, Ohio State’s Board of Trustees approved amending the fiscal year 2026 capital plan to include professional services and construction approval for a College of Veterinary Medicine library redesign, with total project cost listed at $4.5 million in university funds. Board materials from March 5, 2026, also show new endowed chair investments tied to comparative and translational research in oncology, parasitic and infectious diseases, and immunology. (vmc.vet.osu.edu)
The address’s references to AI also fit a larger university push. Ohio State announced an AI Fluency initiative in June 2025 to embed AI education more broadly across the curriculum, while university technology leadership has separately described AI integration as a strategic priority for teaching, research, and operations. The veterinary college itself has already been moving toward outcomes-based curriculum design, so AI appears to be entering an environment that is already in active redesign rather than a static curriculum. That doesn’t tell us exactly how the college will use AI in veterinary education, but it does suggest the State of the College message was aligned with university-wide direction. (engineering.osu.edu)
Industry reaction specific to the March 24 address was limited in publicly indexed coverage, but Ohio State’s broader messaging this year shows where stakeholders are likely focused. Through its Protect OHIO initiative, the college has said it wants to increase class size from 165 to 200 over time, beginning with 10 to 12 additional students in fall 2026, to address rural and large-animal workforce shortages. It has also awarded more than 35 scholarships through that initiative, backed by state support and commodity-group alignment. Winter 2026 department updates suggest Protect OHIO is also showing up in more operational ways: the Department of Veterinary Preventive Medicine said it is using National Animal Disease Preparedness and Response Program funding to work directly with producers on biosecurity gaps, livestock-market risk reduction, and outreach to small farms in response to disease threats including highly pathogenic avian influenza in poultry and dairy cattle. In the same seasonal update, the college highlighted the addition of Aaron Pospisil, DVM ’17, to Large Animal Services at Marysville, bringing dairy and equine medicine, herd-health consulting, and producer-facing experience back into the college’s field service footprint. (vet.osu.edu)
That same Winter 2026 roundup also reinforced the college’s One Health positioning. Amanda Berrian, DVM, MPH, PhD, DACVPM, associate professor in Veterinary Preventive Medicine, was named the inaugural Dr. Tom Mack Chair for Global One Health in September 2025. The appointment recognized her work across the college’s Veterinary Public Health Program and the university’s Global One Health initiative, and it fits the State of the College emphasis on leadership, research capacity, and cross-sector relevance. Taken together, those updates make the March address feel less like a standalone speech and more like a summary of a college trying to expand at multiple levels at once: student training, specialty care, agricultural disease preparedness, rural and large-animal service, and One Health leadership.
Why it matters: For veterinary professionals, especially referral partners, employers, and academic clinicians, Ohio State’s update is a readout on how one large veterinary college is trying to balance three pressures at once: workforce demand, educational reform, and capital intensity. More seats and more scholarships could help address access and supply, but only if the college can sustain faculty, staff, clinical caseload, and facilities needed to train those students well. The added emphasis on biosecurity outreach, producer collaboration, and One Health leadership also matters beyond campus, because it connects veterinary education to livestock resilience, food-system protection, and public-health preparedness. And for practicing veterinarians, changes in curriculum, specialty infrastructure, diagnostic capacity, and regional large-animal service at an academic center can shape referral patterns, externship pipelines, and the preparedness of new graduates entering practice. (vet.osu.edu)
What to watch: The next signals will be concrete ones: whether the planned class-size increase begins in fall 2026, how quickly the library redesign and other capital projects move forward, whether additional facility investments are announced, how visibly AI is incorporated into teaching and clinical workflows, and whether Protect OHIO-linked efforts in biosecurity, large-animal service, and One Health continue to scale as the college implements its strategic plan. (vet.osu.edu)