-: For the most part in this day and age,
pretty much all zoos want you to at least
have a bachelor's degree
so you definitely need to get an education in science.
If you're interested in psychology, that's great.
Biology, that's great.
We don't really care what kind of science you do
as long as you have that background.
But more important than school is
actually the experience.
Really, internships and getting the hands-on experience
is key because most of what we do
you can not learn in a book.
You have to be there and see the animal
and see their behaviors, see their reactions,
to actually have that knowledge.
It's not something that you can really write down
in a book and teach in a class.
So I think, for any future students that are interested,
definitely take classes on animal behavior,
animal welfare.
Learn all you can about animals and biology.
And personally, I hate all of the veterinary stuff,
but it's important.
But really getting internships, getting early-on,
hands-on experience is key.
Again, the internships, a lot of zoos have...
I mean, my zoo has an unpaid internship
where you come twice a week for eight hours
and you are basically a zookeeper.
You follow us around and do everything that we do.
And that is something that's great.
You can start building on that.
If that's not available to you,
really any animal experience.
If you have to work in a vet office,
PetCo or PetSmart.
Having just animal experience, in general, is great.
A lot of it is just getting incredibly lucky.
Like I said, having internships,
working at different zoos is great
because then the keepers there will know you.
And then if a job opening comes up,
they can either let you know
or you can be like, "Hey, I really want this job."
So just getting to know the zoo community as a whole
is really key.