Nursing Students

Crown Vets is a veterinary nurse training practice and in addition to our qualified Veterinary Nurses, we have up to four trainee VNs at any one time.

Aside from the degree course, at Napier University, there are two stages to VN training. If you have five standard grades at grade C or above, then you can enter year one of the formal training and after the second year, if you pass the NVQ, you become a qualified VN. If you don’t have the required entry grades to get into year one of the NVQ training, then you can apply to train as an animal nursing assistant or ANA. After completing the ANA training, you can then enter year-one of the NVQ training or stay with a practice and work as an ANA. Our trainee VNs and ANAs do their training with Thurso College however there are courses elsewhere, including Telford College in Edinburgh. You need to be over the age of seventeen-years-old to train as a VN and applications are accepted from women or men!

It is up to the individual VN student to find a pro-active practice to support them through their studies and we would recommend that you approach a practice first and then arrange for a place at Thurso College.

Please do contact us, if you are looking to enter VN training. We do recommend that you have spent some time doing work experience at a veterinary practice to find out whether the career is right for you. If you would like to join us for work experience, please contact us with as much notice as possible as we do receive a large number of requests for work experience every year and we can’t accommodate everyone. If you are considering a career as a veterinary nurse or you would like to find out more about being a VN, please contact our head nurse, Janet Stevenson or our VN assessor, Yvonne MacKay. There are some further guidance notes on the RCVS web site.