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Labs in the morning, lectures in the afternoon, a quick check on an ailing calf, and a detour to x-ray a dog or a kitten – sounds like a typical day for Veterinary Technology instructor Chris Mizzi.

Chris has been training veterinary technologists at ������Ƶ’s Fairview campus since 2012. Unlike many NWP instructors, Chris rides herd on more than students: the working farm includes sixty to eighty head of cattle, a flock of sheep, a rotating cast of cats and dogs in the clinic, and an array of visiting animals throughout the school year.

A registered veterinarian originally from Winnipeg, Chris owned and worked at veterinary practices in Manitoba and Alberta for almost a decade before joining the team at NWP.

“Since I left vet school, I’d been teaching people,” Chris explains. From demonstrating simple procedures to guiding student volunteers, he’d always enjoyed the teaching portion of running a practice. So when an opportunity came up at NWP, Chris thought it might be fun to try teaching full-time. More than ten years later, Chris is still finding ways to make teaching, and learning, fun for his students and himself.

Chris’s course load includes nutrition, diagnostic imaging, pathology, math, microbiology and immunology classes, among others. “I look forward to all my courses,” he protests when asked to pick a favourite. 

“I try to make every lecture hands-on and exciting.” 

This means bringing anatomy models, samples, vaccines and more into the classroom to keep the content engaging and entertaining.

NWP’s on-site farm and animal hospital provide ample opportunities for students to handle, treat and care for live patients of all sizes. Students take part in calving and lambing rotations, help raise and treat large farm animals, and learn to spay or neuter, deworm, and vaccinate dogs and cats. A week of exotic animal study means guest speakers bring in snakes, frogs, and turtles for study, including Chris’s own pet axolotls.

Considering veterinary technology? “It’s a great profession. I enjoy going to work,” Chris says. 

“You get to help animals and ease their suffering or extend their lifespan.” 

It’s demanding, he acknowledges, but for people with a connection to animals and a desire to help them, it can be a good fit.

Chris’s teaching philosophy is to be fair, honest and fun. He draws on the best parts of his own post-secondary years to shape his time in the classroom. He’s rewarded when he sees a student finally grasp a new or challenging task. “It sounds cheesy,” he says, “but when they realize they can do it, you see the lightbulb go on and a big smile on their face.”

When Chris isn’t at his day job of “cow mechanic”, as he puts it, he’s putting in more hours on his hobby farm with his veterinarian wife and three kids. “We have a 'funny farm',” he jokes, housing emus, newts, frogs, axolotls and peacocks alongside more traditional chickens, turkeys, goats, dogs and cats. He uses those mechanic skills on antique vehicles as well.

With twenty-plus years of veterinary medicine under his belt, Chris still shares enthusiasm and passion for the profession with his colleagues and students. NWP won’t count its chickens before they hatch, but it’s fair to say that the Veterinary Technology program hopes to keep Chris on the farm until the cows come home.