The prevailing explanation for the lack of diversity in veterinary medicine has been a lack of adequate recruitment of students into US veterinary colleges and, thus, into the profession. The reason most often given for this failure to enroll larger numbers of underrepresented minority students has been referred to as the “leaky pipeline”: of the many underrepresented minority high school students interested in health careers, few select veterinary medicine as their career
choice because other health professions are more attractive. Data from the US Department of Education’s Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) show that in
1999/2000, 9,331 members of underrepresented minorities received degrees in the following health profession programs: chiropractic, dentistry, human medicine, optometry, pharmacy, podiatry, and veterinary medicine. Of these, 54% earned their degrees in human medicine, 19% in pharmacy, 14% in dentistry, nearly 6% in chiropractic medicine, slightly less than 2% in veterinary medicine, and 1.5% in podiatry.
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