The American Veterinary Medical Association Council on Education is inviting public comment as part of a review of its standards for accrediting veterinary education.

The COE, the programmatic accrediting body for veterinary education in the U.S. and Canada, periodically audits three or four accreditation standards annually and revisits the standards as a whole every four years.

This year’s review is of all 11 COE standards.

The goal is to determine whether the standards are easy to interpret and help prepare graduates to work in the veterinary profession, according to an AVMA press release published Monday.

The COE is seeking input two ways:

• A multiple-choice public survey is open until Dec. 31. All stakeholders are invited to weigh in.
• A second survey will be sent to a statistically representative sample of veterinarians, academicians and veterinary students, as well as executive directors of state veterinary medical associations and deans of all of the nation’s veterinary colleges that are U.S.-accredited. This survey also will close at the end of 2018.

The COE Academic Affairs Committee is charged with reviewing the feedback and making recommendations to the full body. Any revisions to the standards will be made public.