How do people afford to consistently show multiple horses?

[joliemom_again]

@CHT

Local rider used to finance her 6 month out of the year show schedule by being a high end stripper.

I don’t think her horse was particularly expensive (jumper and eventer), so she didn’t have a huge upfront cost, but she was able to afford a nice truck and trailer and to be on the road showing.

Damn it, at 63 I have the time but I no longer have the body nor the face nor the hair nor the energy to stay up past 9pm.

To add something useful to the conversation, don’t be tied down geographically, be willing to move to more affordable areas that offer a good work/life balance so you can enjoy your horses. Because whatever career you end up in is going to require you to work your butt off for a good ten years post undergrad or grad school.

Speaking of careers, you can also look at the other end of start ups, which in my mind is venture cap/private equity where your knowledge of an industry be it AI, blockchain, or medtech is extremely valuable. But again, know that it’s long hours.

Controversial statement to follow…

Be very careful as you enter these careers as a woman (assuming you are sys gendered female ). Neither STEM nor finance are particulary friendly to women. And that’s as nicely as I can word this.

[snaffle1987]

I think at the WEF/California/Select northeast locations you are looking at extreme wealth situations.
You live in Silicone Valley which is in a state where cost of living alone are extremely high. People living in Silcone Valley are far wealthier than the majority of Americans.

That aside, these people who are funding multiple six figure horses, training, shows every week are likely not working full time, travelling to all the big shows. This level of people are trust fund babies or financially backed by a wealthy spouse who is from generational wealth or making bank themselves. There is no way on God’s green earth that these people can ride and train all day, show for weeks on end at WEF or other places and still report to work everyday like the rest of every American.

Unfortunately; the upper echelon of the H/J world is what it always has been…a play land for the rich to spend money and keep their kids and grandkids and spouses happy.

I grew up in a well-off family who did not come from generational wealth but built it themselves in business. I showed locally at rated shows almost every weekend and had some nice horses in the barn that were bought cheap as young prospects. We did a lot ourselves to be able to afford to do it. No grooms, no multiple training sessions per month, did all of our own trailering, barn work, etc. I am thankful for that because it helped to build a strong work ethic in my adult life. But with that being said, after High School I pretty much ceased showing, went to college, stopped riding, work full time/10 hour days in a corporate office. I make solid money but not nearly “wealthy”. I never married and am certainly not the trophy wife material.

I have no interest in returning to that level of the game or playing in fantasy land that so many people do these days. It’s different when you enter adult life and priorities change; especially if you are not funded by mega wealth.

I currently reside in a very wealthy area where a lot of the upper echelon of the H/J land lives and plays. Funded by old money and spouses who are wealth investors, etc who have so much money in their bank accounts that it’s essentially expendable. Private jets to take them wherever they please, full time barn staff, massive estates and multiple homes. The level that these people are playing at is truly fantasy land.

I always told myself if I was going to marry, It was for love. I was never going to be that person to seek out a husband because of his salary to fund my life. But for others’ it is very much part of the life plan.

Just remember…Fantasy Land

[trakehners]

@dmveventer

@julia.eq.h

I don’t want to come off as money hungry but I do want to be able to support my lifestyle!!

Choosing a job based on earning potential and stability is not a bad thing at all, it’s the practical and mature thing to do. You’ll find that the vast majority of people aren’t working “dream jobs” and even those that are don’t love 100% of what they do. Work is work, it exists to pay for the rest of your life. I do like my job but there are plenty of things I don’t like about it, and if the paycheck stopped I would 100% stop showing up.

Echoing this—I work in finance, am good at it, and make very good money, but it is absolutely not something that I love in any way. It pays my horse-related bills and lets me have the life I want to have and that’s why I do it. I don’t hate it (usually) but it brings me no real joy or fulfillment outside of my paycheck. I’ve said for a long time that every major decision I’ve made since I was fourteen has been in service of having and affording the life that I live now. I’m not greedy—it infuriates my brother and his girlfriend to no end that I don’t demand more money all the time when I don’t need it—but I am clear-eyed about the finances required to accomplish my goals.

OP, don’t feel bad about looking at your life and career this way. There are some strange people out there who love the careers that most of the rest of us are just doing for the paycheck (I’m looking at you, audit partner at my old public accounting firm who got way too much enjoyment out of the audit life), but the vast majority of us are just trying to fund the things in our lives that do bring us joy and contentment in our overall existence. It’s not greedy to want a life where you don’t have to worry about that.

[tohorse]

@joliemom_again

Be very careful as you enter these careers as a woman (assuming you are sys gendered female ). Neither STEM nor finance are particulary friendly to women. And that’s as nicely as I can word this.

As someone who did both finance and tech to have enough money for horses I can wholeheartedly agree with this. I quit to do my own thing once I was called back into office, and couldn’t see myself combining horses, pets, house, a kid and the high intensity career I had in finance when I was expected to show up and put in my face time (very infuriating).

Do I have regrets? None at all. Both taught me some great things and work ethic that serve me now as a small business owner. But I think it’s healthy to understand that once you reach mid-senior level in those fields the number of women particularly in finance starts to thin out considerably … and for good reasons. I endured a lot of uneccessary brain damage until I reached the state of acceptance.

Now husband pays most of the bills for 2 horses while I build my own business. It’s slowly changing but unless you have large contracts, it’s pretty hard to build a large business in a year or two. But watching your efforts compound is really amazing. So yeah… marry well is excellent advice. Working for myself and having all the responsibility I’ve found to so far to be much more fun, but I think it’s a personality type and you need to decide whether you’d like that as a path for yourself.

ETA: I also quit riding until my late twenties - a gap of almost 10 years to build up my resume, move around a lot and live life like most other people do. I did some weekend riding school instructor gigs as I was moving around to be around horses, but as you know it’s hard work and not always a lot of fun. And then my husband became the enabler and ended up gifting me my first horse. Agree with people who say that most people come back to be somewhat competitive once they build up their lives. I’ve seen it again and again with my riding friends from high school.

[Eclectic_Horseman]

@julia.eq.h

I am a high schooler and I won’t chase a job just for money but I do love horses and showing. Showing and riding is one of my favorite things to do and I’m terrified that I won’t be able to afford it one day!

It’s worth taking a look at the US Dept of Labor Occupational handbook to see what types of jobs are projected to be in demand, what they pay, and what the necessary qualifications are. Here’s the link.

https://www.bls.gov/ooh/home.htm

[dags]

@dmveventer

You will almost certainly have to step back from riding and/or showing at least temporarily at some point, unless your parents are willing to bankroll your riding through your twenties. It’s not the end of the world.

I don’t think we stress this enough. I graduated college, went pro in a HCOL area (Santa Barbara), eventually realized I would never own property of any sort there (especially a barn, and I was currently at the mercy of some crazy barn owners with no education), and re-located to be closer to my family in another HCOL area— Chicago.

Between Chicago weather and traffic and $$$$ boarding situations, I kind of subconsciously made the decision to hang up the spurs for awhile. I own a business in the industry, so I’ve always had my foot in the door, but I wasn’t actively riding at all.

And I discovered that there’s a whole freaking world out there There are these things called WEEKENDS, and I honestly don’t think I’ll ever be able to give those up on the regular again. I went camping for days on end & traveled for weeks on end, dabbled in rock climbing, played city rat on my bike in chicago, went to music shows, spent days at the beach, stayed out way too late at night, made some of the best friends of my life and they don’t know Thing 1 about horses (also conveniently lack the drama/cray-cray that tends to come with horse folk), met my totally non-horsey husband who then happily followed me to KY when I decided I was ready to re-introduce horses. I wouldn’t trade a single solitary moment of that life for horse show ribbons.

I also slowly realized just how isolated the horse world is from the rest of society, how removed it is from economic reality, and how ignorant it is of current events— proudly ignorant, I dare say. And the repercussions of such isolation are seen all over the desperate actions of our incompetent governing bodies.

@julia.eq.h

Showing and riding is one of my favorite things to do and I’m terrified that I won’t be able to afford it one day!

I wouldn’t write this assertion in stone. Showing is a blast when someone else is paying for it, someone else is doing the majority of the hard labor, sleep isn’t a high priority, and every peer around you is in some sort of competitive pursuit. You may very well keep this enthusiasm for the show ring, or you may find it wanes, or you may find out (like most of us) that you simply can’t afford to show at the levels you enjoyed as a kid. And all of this is okay. If you’re lucky, you’re looking at probably 5, 6, 7 decades of dealing with this quirky-ass horse obsession that never leaves, whether you’re actively riding or not. Pace yourself

[fivestrideline]

@dags

I wouldn’t write this assertion in stone. Showing is a blast when someone else is paying for it, someone else is doing the majority of the hard labor, sleep isn’t a high priority, and every peer around you is in some sort of competitive pursuit.

This. It’s incredible the amount of stress that happens when you’re suddenly the one paying the $5k show bill (or even the $500 one), and you may one day find that even if that bill is technically affordable, it may suck all the fun out of showing. I love horse showing, I’m competitive by nature, but at a certain level the costs outweigh the fun. And that’s okay!

At the same time, building a career so that you have time and money to do fun stuff is totally worth it. Find what you’re good at and that you don’t hate, and go for it. Not many people actually love their jobs and I don’t think you need to in order to be fulfilled! That “do what you love” advice comes from a time where it was acceptable to have work be your ENTIRE life vs a way to fund the things you actually enjoy.

[Eclectic_Horseman]

@fivestrideline

It’s incredible the amount of stress that happens when you’re suddenly the one paying the $5k show bill (or even the $500 one)

Or the VET BILL, and now you’re also still paying a whole lot for a horse that is on stall rest.

[Ponyplusaninch]

Another person in HR/talent aq strategy land who works primarily with startups/high growth tech companies–so just as an FYI, for the last two years, we have seen very minimal change (<3%) of the number of remote and hybrid jobs offered. COVID has officially changed the way a lot of businesses do business now. Even in office jobs have had less than a <2% increase since Q1 2022. Do not let the media tell you otherwise because the data is there and is clear Remote and hybrid are going to continue to be very real options, and I’m here for it.

What is REALLY fascinating is the effect this has had on salary numbers, too. It used to be the difference between Tier 1 (SF, NYC, Seattle) and Tier 2 (Chicago, Portland, Atlanta, LA, etc) was a 15%+ difference. That has closed dramatically in the past few years since COVID. That gap is now less than 10%. And Tier 3 is practically on top of Tier 2. This impacts all industries. To be clear: there are still gaps, and there will be some local, in-office jobs that won’t pay to play. But if you have a tech component to your company that drives business, chances are you have had to dramatically adjust your salary bands to keep your top talent vs. going out and rehiring again. Even though it’s a down market, those salary numbers between the tiers have stayed fairly stagnant or even close slightly.

Now all that said, it is a REALLY bad time to try and get a degree as an entry level software dev. The problem I’m seeing, and I have literally been stating to ANYONE in academia who will hear me (but they aren’t listening, they just want their tuition money) is that entry level jobs are disappearing in favor of AI. AI and more advanced automation is taking over a lot of the work companies used to put entry level devs on.

Why? FAANG is doing it, that’s part of it. Whatever FAANG does tends to have ripple down effects in terms of what other tech companies do for their strategies, including hybrid/remote work. The other part of this is that your average Silicon Valley start up is shifting. People are angry about all the inappropriate spending, the overly charismatic and egomaniac CEOs, and the lack of focus on stable, long term growth.

The newer start-ups that are gaining footholds are more focused on EBITA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, and Amortization) and focusing on profitability. One of the big discoveries that came out of the H1 Carta Start Up report is that hiring has been fairly flat. And when people are hiring, they are targeting more senior, experienced individual contributors who can give immediate ROI.

Now THAT ALL SAID… I don’t think the entry level dev role is dead, but I do think it’s due to be reborn, and this is two-fold. First, academia has got to shift its curriculum. Like just rip it to shreds and start fresh. AI isn’t going anywhere, and entry level devs need to learn it and find other subject matter that’s going to be useful and form essentially a new job description for what it means to be an entry level dev.

The second part of this is that senior talent doesn’t last forever. People move on, they don’t want to do the same thing every day, etc. Hiring a senior-heavy team is a short term gain that will get your start up far for about 2.5 years (presuming best case scenario for tenure) and then you’ll stagnate. There still needs to be a pipeline of associates who rise to that senior level.

As others have stated, 10 years from now it’s probably going to be a different landscape than where we are today.

The best things that young folks can do going forward to set themselves up for success:

1. Learn how to learn. The biggest deficit I see in talent today is that folks of all ages do not know how they learn best, and this can inevitably pigeon hole someone down the line. Figure out what the process is for you to learn new, strange unfamiliar material. Do you do best as a visual learner? An audio learner? How do you mitigate mistakes when mastering new subject matter? Who do you go to when you need help? How effective are you at finding additional info? This will set you up well for any career, particularly any high level career.
2. Invest in therapy because you need to know how to work with difficult people and keep yourself sane. This is why I earn my keep and can command my compensation ask: I work with difficult people, get them to move in directions they don’t want to move in, and the company ends up successful (ie makes money). For all other jobs, learning to work well with others, manage up, manage down, etc typically leads to quicker career growth. EQ is such a hard skill to learn, and I think the best way to start is in therapy because you can learn about yourself and why you operate the way you do. This then can help influence how you approach others, understand them, and influence them.
3. Start understanding economics now and building a foundation of what is trending in industry. These trends are always going to be changing, so the point of this is to develop the habit of being abreast of these things. Get a subscription to The Economist and start reading it. Subscribe to Freakonomics Podcast. Listen to Planet Money and Marketplace. See if your school offers free newspaper subscriptions you can digitally access like WSJ and NYTimes. Figure out what your sources are that you can digest and build the habit of reading them, whether that’s 1x a morning, while working out, weekend news only, etc.
4. Take a class outside your normal comfort zone/interest. If you go on LinkedIn, you will find that many people’s majors have absolutely no bearing or correlation to what they’re doing in their career today. And I’d say 50% of the time I speak to people, it’s because they took a class they normally wouldn’t have taken in high school or in college, and it completely changed their trajectory. So don’t be afraid to do this. Try something totally wild. Take a theatre class, take a class on AI, take a sociology course. It will have an impact on you whether or not you recognize it immediately.

Doing these three things will help tee you up for success no matter what career path you go down. You’re building a flexible mind that understands how the world works and how to influence it. You’ll find something that resonates with you and your skills.

SUPER long post, apologies, but I hope this helps you, OP, as well as other young folks out there trying to go “how do I find what I’m doing in life and still have room (and finances) for riding?”

[poltroon]

@Tini_Sea_Soldier1

Not to mention that constant shake-up in tech. It’s legit a roller coaster and I’ve seen so many people blind-sided by RIFs and I can count 8 people that I know currently that have been laid off from tech and haven’t found a job in 6 months and counting.
It would be my worst nightmare to try to manage to float 2-3 horses without a paycheck.

I’m currently in that situation though my horses are home and inexpensive so they aren’t particularly a concern. (Anyone with inside job leads, hit me up! Getting through the AI screen is so hard right now. )

@julia.eq.h

This is kind of off topic but what jobs can I do to support having one nice horse, a nice house, etc.
I am a high schooler and I won’t chase a job just for money but I do love horses and showing. Showing and riding is one of my favorite things to do and I’m terrified that I won’t be able to afford it one day!

I’m good at math, maybe 3 years ahead from normal path, and I want to become an electrical engineer/ computer engineer with a double major in Econ or entrepreneurship. Currently I am working on some coding projects and stuff which I really enjoy, takes my mind off of the horse pressure sometimes.

I don’t want to come off as money hungry but I do want to be able to support my lifestyle!!

Tech positions can be wonderful for flexibility and if it’s something you already enjoy, I’d definitely encourage you to look in that direction. Being able to work remote and with flexible hours is great for being able to travel to horse shows, take lessons, and possibly live in a more horsey area. Most likely you won’t have time or money for multiple Hunter/Jumpers on the circuit, but for enjoying a horse, possibly for dressage or eventing or a lower level of H/J involvement, yes.

The downsides are that the industry can be very fickle especially once you’re over 40, and getting the right job where you are valued and happy is not easy for everyone. When you are out of work, it can take a long time to get a new position. Employers ask for 5 years of experience in 2 year old tech all the time. Your network of people who know you is very key for getting new jobs. STEM is not the golden ticket to employment that many people suggest, but it is an amazing base that will most likely serve you well even if you leave the field.

My degree is actually in Mechanical/Aero Engineering (though I ended up with a career in software and data and Product) and one thing I did not realize in college is that the ‘hard’ engineering disciplines (I don’t mean difficult, I mean physical) are often very tied to specific cities. Aero in particular is very tied to a handful of locations. One of my MechE friends ended up working on oil rigs which didn’t suit her particularly (and I note is not horse compatible). So as part of your career exploration, think about that aspect as well, where people work after they graduate from your proposed major from your university, and if that’s a fit for you.

Employers are often not very flexible or forward looking in hiring people who aren’t trained exactly for their position, so even though you might have a very strong STEM base, picking the wrong specialization can be a problem, especially if you don’t have your network to say “she’s a quick learner, we should grab her while we can for this slightly different but related task.”

Having a personal/public coding portfolio at Github will help you, so those projects are a great start.

The computer/ee mix would fit very well right now at places like NVIDIA which my friends say is a nice place to work.

It’s not money-hungry at all. Never forget that there are a lot of pressures on women to take less money for the work that they do. You sound like you’re on a terrific trajectory.

[dags]

@Ponyplusaninch

I work with difficult people, get them to move in directions they don’t want to move in, and the company ends up successful (ie makes money).

OMG. you’re a real life Wendy Rhoades

[LaurieB]

@Ponyplusaninch, your “super long” post was amazing.

[Renn_aissance]

@julia.eq.h

This is kind of off topic but what jobs can I do to support having one nice horse, a nice house, etc.
I am a high schooler and I won’t chase a job just for money but I do love horses and showing. Showing and riding is one of my favorite things to do and I’m terrified that I won’t be able to afford it one day!

While he was in high school, my husband had this conversation with his father. Husband didn’t really feel called to a particular career path; he wanted a job with stability, reasonable working hours, and earning potential so that he could enjoy the rest of his life.

My FIL told him “Well, as far as I can tell you have three options. You can work on an oil rig. You can be a mining engineer. You can be a pharmacist.”

He went to pharmacy school.

He’s now working for a state hospital. He makes “can pay a mortgage and play golf on the weekends” money and, once he worked there for 10 years, he became fully vested in the state pension plan, which is very good (and also likely to still exist when he retires.) As a state employee he has excellent job security, insurance, and a bonkers amount of PTO. Research pays more but the job security is not as good. CVS might also pay more, but the job stress in retail pharmacy wasn’t worth it to him.

He would have made more as a mining engineer or on an oil rig, but this option was more consistent with his values.

If he weren’t allergic/had any interest, his salary could afford buying a nice young Thoroughbred horse, having it in training, and showing locally.

I make a similar salary in educational technology- I’m a hybrid of product management, product architecture, incident management, and development. I can’t recommend it as a career path because I got here by accident and the ed tech hiring world is pretty volatile right now.

The people I know personally who are on the circuit with multiple nice horses are children of parents who are high level banking executives or hospital specialty physicians or similar. The parents have time to ride maybe two times a week, so it’s the kids who have the multiple nice horses.

[fivestrideline]

@Ponyplusaninch

Another person in HR/talent aq strategy land who works primarily with startups/high growth tech companies–so just as an FYI, for the last two years, we have seen very minimal change (<3%) of the number of remote and hybrid jobs offered. COVID has officially changed the way a lot of businesses do business now. Even in office jobs have had less than a <2% increase since Q1 2022. Do not let the media tell you otherwise because the data is there and is clear

Ah, it may be the case for startups and big growth tech - but it is not the case in my sector (big corporate engineering companies). A lot of positions were hired on as remote or hybrid and are now being shoe-horned back into the office, and the truly remote positions are incredibly competitive and not going to new hires. LG and YAMAHA have poached a lot of upper talent from my company and others like it because they’re offering remote/hybrid - but based in rather meh areas for horses.

I guess, as always, it really depends! However I entirely agree with everything else you said - it’s a fabulous crash course in real world focus for someone like OP.

[poltroon]

@Eclectic_Horseman

It’s worth taking a look at the US Dept of Labor Occupational handbook to see what types of jobs are projected to be in demand, what they pay, and what the necessary qualifications are. Here’s the link.

https://www.bls.gov/ooh/home.htm

Be a little careful with the way you look at these stats. For ages they’ve highlighted for example Astronomy as a field that will have “shortages” or “fast growth” which has become kind of a sick joke among my astronomer friends. (In truth: Astronomy is a field where you wait for someone to die or retire, and the number of US PhD graduates every year is perilously similar to the total number of Astronomy positions in the US.)

[phoenixrises]

Look at being a Quant. Then get in with a quantitative trading company. Citadel, SIG (not the weapon manufacturer), and a couple in NYC if you want a list.

It’s high stress, if you don’t perform you’re out but starting salary is very high with huge bonuses. Need a PhD

Actuaries area also pretty good start pay and bonuses.

Neither of these jobs are helping humanity but that isn’t what you asked for

[poltroon]

@fivestrideline

This. It’s incredible the amount of stress that happens when you’re suddenly the one paying the $5k show bill (or even the $500 one), and you may one day find that even if that bill is technically affordable, it may suck all the fun out of showing. I love horse showing, I’m competitive by nature, but at a certain level the costs outweigh the fun. And that’s okay!

At the same time, building a career so that you have time and money to do fun stuff is totally worth it. Find what you’re good at and that you don’t hate, and go for it. Not many people actually love their jobs and I don’t think you need to in order to be fulfilled! That “do what you love” advice comes from a time where it was acceptable to have work be your ENTIRE life vs a way to fund the things you actually enjoy.

Just want to agree that you’ll be able to be with horses your whole life. Make time to learn about other stuff. Especially in college - you’ll have so many opportunities to do very different things than you ever imagined on the weekends, and to do cool projects that will not be available to you when you are a full adult. Let the horses go so you can do those things. The horses will still be there when you are done.

I did a wonderful research project in astronomy/planetary science where I spent the summer at an observatory, working through every clear night, and what an amazing experience that was.

It’s great to find work that is meaningful, but it’s also good to have your hobbies be completely non-monetized. It’s hard to love horses when you depend on them to act a certain way to pay your rent. It’s hard to love your art when you have to depend on people to buy it at regular intervals and you have to produce on a deadline. There’s a lot of work that makes the world better and a lot of great co-workers out there (even in STEM, I’ve been much luckier than many of my friends) that pays well and gives you time to do the other things too.

One of the reasons things have stalled in the tech job market right this minute has been the rising interest rates. When rates were nearly zero, a lot of money was chasing a lot of harebrained ideas and they were hiring tech people hand over fist, possibly without even a clear reason why or what value those people would produce. Now that interest rates have risen, they’ve swung the other way, shedding people who do produce clear value.

The field I work in didn’t exist when I graduated. Keep learning, learn to learn, and keep creating evidence that you do so. Try not to spend everything you make on horses because there will be downturns. Especially for women in tech, it can be helpful to build your reputation by speaking at conferences and attending professional events. Make lots of professional friends and stay in touch.

[Ponyplusaninch]

Hysterically, for one CEO I worked with, he legit said “I need you to be my Wendy Rhoades” when I was interviewing for the job. That was a WILD ride of 6 months but we got a lot done. And I got some great stories to tell.

Also, just to have full transparency with the OP and finances–our HHI is close to $300k/annual (adjusted this figure because I was thinking about savings/investments), we live in a fairly LCOL area, and I am still sweating over the small stuff with horses. It is in fact a second mortgage payment. I pay for top care for my horse, and that eats away at my take-home pay.

With that in mind, my job is always on the table. Typically HR/Talent Aq jobs go first when companies want to downsize, as cutting wage expenses is the quickest way to make an impact on EBITA. So that’s something else you have to think about in your future: how much risk are you willing to take on? And what are you prepared to do to mitigate that risk?

I am very, very fortunate that my SO has an incredibly boring, stable public sector job. It pays probably 70% to what he could make in private sector, but that’s the sacrifice he made to have that super steady income.

That then affords me the opportunity to be a lot more risky in my career. High risk/high reward. It is not for the faint of heart, and it is not for everyone, and that is a-OK.

For me it means I have to be accepting of the fact that if something goes wrong in my career, horse stuff gets put on the shelf almost immediately. It’s not something I can sustain long-term without a job. My savings (which are healthy) would be demolished in 6 mo or less if I continued to have the horse on my bills.

[fivestrideline]

Also, @julia.eq.h, I’ll offer a tidbit from my (relatively recent) college days plus watching my brother go through school now…

Don’t trust college recruiters and academic advisors. Both before and during college. Their jobs are to take your money and bolster school stats - a high percentage of them have no actual idea what is going on in the job market. Do your own research, talk to people in the field. Once you’re in school, check your class requirements yourself, make sure you are getting pre-reqs for any programs or further education you’re interested in. Plenty of advisors will tell you you’re on track until the semester before you graduate where it turns out you actually DO need O-Chem instead of geology to get into vet school “lol oopsies!”. Do your homework, literally and figuratively.

Similarly, don’t go to a school that doesn’t offer your major or focus already - some will offer to “build you a program” and tempt you with scholarships or maybe a spot on an equestrian team. However, as I said before, your list of classes and major/minors really matter less than internships and connections in the industry. Pick a school that fits your strengths and offers the programs you want - or go the community college route and transfer into that school.

This is all going to be very overwhelming but I promise things have a way of working out if you’re smart. Focus on school and early career even if it means stepping back from showing for a few years - you can often find ways to ride for cheap while you build your career!

[julia.eq.h]

Yes! It was so in-depth!