Vet Tech Programs in Kentucky

Kentucky's 4 programs split across two degree levels, and Morehead State University in Morehead is the only entry AVMA lists for both an Associate of Applied Science and a Bachelor of Science.

MedQuest College in Lexington and Owensboro Community and Technical College in Owensboro each list an associate degree, and Murray State University in Murray lists one degree, which AVMA prints as a Bachelor in Science.

That makes 3 associate-level entries and 2 bachelor's-level entries across the 4 programs.

They sit in Lexington, Morehead, Murray and Owensboro, and no entry carries a former name or a separate distance listing.

What the list does not show — what each program charges, how it is scheduled, or where its graduates place — is a question for the school.

MedQuest College in Lexington is the only Kentucky entry whose status line is not plain full accreditation: AVMA lists it on initial accreditation, dated August 18, 2022, with a next evaluation in 2027.

AVMA's definition puts the label in context: initial accreditation is not punitive and is simply the terminology for a newly accredited program, it does not mean a program is at higher risk of losing accreditation, and graduates of an initially accredited program count as graduates of an accredited program.

August 18, 2022 is also the most recent initial-accreditation date on Kentucky's list; Owensboro Community and Technical College's, in January 2015, is the next most recent.

The practical follow-up for an applicant is to ask MedQuest College for its published first-time VTNE pass rate.

Morehead State University in Morehead is the only Kentucky program AVMA lists at both levels: its single entry shows an Associate of Applied Science and a Bachelor of Science.

Murray State University in Murray lists one degree line, which AVMA prints as a Bachelor in Science.

Both entries carry plain full accreditation, and their initial-accreditation dates — November 1977 for Morehead State and November 1986 for Murray State — are the two earliest on Kentucky's list.

An applicant set on the bachelor's level is choosing between these two.

None of Kentucky's 4 entries appears on AVMA's separate distance-education list.

AVMA names 13 distance programs in all, each listed under the state where it is based, and all of them are printed lower on this page.

Kentucky's education rule asks for a degree from an AVMA CVTEA-accredited program rather than a Kentucky-based one, so an accredited distance program meets the requirement the same way the in-state programs do.

For any of them, a Kentucky resident needs two answers from the school: whether it admits students living in Kentucky, and how it arranges the supervised clinical hours every accredited program requires at a practice near the student.

The Kentucky Board of Veterinary Examiners licenses veterinary technicians as LVTs, and since June 29, 2023 the license has been mandatory to do the work, not just to use the letters: state law bars practicing as a veterinary technician, or performing any of a technician's usual duties, without one.

The education route is an associate or bachelor's degree from an AVMA CVTEA-accredited veterinary technology program, carried into regulation by 201 KAR 16:520; the requirement is accreditation, not location, so every program on the list above — and each accredited program on the distance list lower on this page — satisfies it.

No experience-based route appears in the sources read, so years working in a practice do not replace the degree.

After graduating, an applicant needs a passing VTNE score, applied for through the AAVSB.