Love Jessica’s story? Click here to meet more interns and read their stories!
Jessica Fleisher is a rising senior at Penn State University studying Animal Science. Her plans for the future? She hopes to become a dairy herd manager. To help explore her dream, she is interning at M. W. Smith Farms in Perry County, Pennsylvania this summer. However, Jessica’s story in the dairy industry began long before this internship and long before her journey at Penn State.
Growing up on a 50-cow tie stall farm, Jessica quickly realized that she loved working with cows. She decided early on that she wanted to remain in agriculture throughout her career. This decision was only solidified when she attended Penn State University. As a freshman, she quickly decided she didn’t want to be a veterinarian but still wanted to work with cows every day. She began working at the Penn State Dairy Barns and started her major in Animal Science to prepare to be a herdsman.
“Growing up I always knew that I wanted to work with cows. Cows are what I love,” Jessica shares. “I decided that I wanted to go the herd management route. I’m not 100% dead set on that, but I definitely want to be on the farm in some capacity.”
After deciding to complete an on-farm internship, Jessica’s main goal was to gain experience on a larger dairy farm. Jessica is quickly acquiring these skills as she contributes to the 700-cow dairy operation, which is significantly larger than the farm she grew up on. At this scale, treating cows is part of her daily tasks and responsibilities. Jessica gives routine shots and treats sick cows, and this has been a rewarding part of her experience so far.
“One thing that I’ve enjoyed is seeing the cows we have treated get better,” she explains.
In the end, Jessica’s goal is to leave this internship feeling more prepared to manage a herd down the road. By working with a larger herd and experiencing the routine, farm-level tasks, Jessica is hoping to gain the confidence and skills she needs to work with a variety of herds in the future.
“There are all types of farms. Just having one experience on one size farm doesn’t really get you the whole experience of what everyone else is going through in the dairy industry,” Jessica adds.
—
The Dairy Excellence Foundation, the Professional Dairy Managers of Pennsylvania, and the Pennsylvania Dairymen’s Association provide $3,000 grants to support these on-farm internships each summer.