INTRODUCTION The veterinary medical profession is evolving rapidly in the face of societal changes, technological advancements, economic limitations, and a greater recognition of its application in the public health sector. As emphasized during the conference An Agenda for Action: Veterinary Medicine’s Crucial Role in Biodefense and Public Health, veterinary professionals are ideally suited to address many of the headlining issues in public health, such as bioterrorist and agro-terrorist threats, emerging diseases, and food safety hazards. The critical question to be addressed is whether or not colleges and schools of veterinary medicine have programs sufficiently in place to ensure that these needs will be met by their graduates. Participants in the Summer Fellowship Program in Science, Technology, and Public Policy: Implications for Veterinary Medicine, hosted by the Virginia–Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine in summer 2003, were encouraged to provide a ‘‘student perspective’’ on this issue. Eleven fellows, secondto fourth-year veterinary students from six veterinary schools, participated in the Summer Fellowship, which focused on bioterrorism, agro-terrorism, and homeland security. Students had the opportunity to meet with experts in the field of bioterrorism; veterinarians serving as fellows in the executive and legislative branches in Washington, DC; and veterinarians working for the Department of Defense, the American Veterinary Medical Association, the Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges, industry, the US Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, the Library of Congress, the Homeland Security Council, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Maryland Department of Agriculture. This experience provided the fellows a unique bridge of perception and insight between their own ongoing veterinary education and these critical needs and obligations of veterinary medical education; it also serves as the basis of the ‘‘student perspective’’ described in this article.