Katarina (Kat) Hilton is this year’s recipient of the California Thoroughbred Foundation’s 2022 Western University of Health Sciences scholarship. The Foundation awards scholarships to students at Western University as well as to students at the University of California, Davis. The curriculum vitae, personal essays, and in-person verbal interviews with these students leave our trustees inspired, hopeful, and filled with admiration for these extraordinary young people. They are brilliant, beyond hard-working, and willingly face a challenging life of service to horses.
From an early age, Kat cared for her family’s Thoroughbred horses, became a leader in Pony Club, and later became an event rider who assisted other riders and horses in the recovery veterinarian box. These early experiences made her path very clear: to provide proper medical care as an equine veterinarian. She has shadowed solo and multiple equine practices focused on lameness evaluations, pre-purchase examinations, diagnostic imaging, and movement for a variety of breeds, specifically off-the-track Thoroughbreds.
As a veterinary student, Kat added to her intensive studies with leadership roles in the Western University Chapter of the American Association of Equine Practitioners. Multiple externships for hands-on evaluations, bar scans, MRI, and surgeries furthered her drive to be an ambulatory equine veterinarian.
“Even to be interviewed for this scholarship tells me somebody is recognizing the challenge associated with being an equine veterinarian,” Kat said. “It is a boost to the morale that I am on the right path. To win it opens the gate to offset some of the debt associated with veterinary school and encourages me all the more to keep going. I look forward to my fourth year of school, to gain more experience in sport and internal medicine, to graduate and dedicate myself to be an ambulatory veterinarian and serve the community that has given so much to me.”