Thanks…Times Three

Many people know the College of Veterinary Medicine firsthand through its Veterinary Teaching Hospital. Some 10,000 families a year can attest that the CVM boasts great vets who have brought seriously ill animals back to good health through state-of-the-art diagnostic and treatment capabilities.

But did you know that each well-praised VTH vet is just as spectacular in the classroom and research lab as in the animal clinic? In fact, CVM’s nationally distinguished faculty is fundamentally responsible for helping CVM earn its ongoing reputation as a premier veterinary school. Whether CVM professors are training tomorrow’s vets or researching companion animal allergic diseases, the physiology of tumors, or cardiac conditions, they are committed to helping the companion animals that enrich so many human lives.

Over the last decade, CVM faculty members have saved three of Terry and Jane Seaks’ beloved cats, adding precious years to each cat’s fulfilled life, which was as equally fulfilling to the Seaks themselves. In order to reward and retain “the distinguished professors who make our college famous and heal our animal friends,”  Seaks established CVM’s first-ever endowed distinguished professorship: The Jane Lewis Seaks Distinguished Professorship for Companion Animal Medicine. Seaks hopes that the professorship, which honors his wife, will also “attract future star professors.”

The Seaks’ donation provided a third of the necessary funds to launch the $1 million endowed professorship. In turn, the R.B. Terry Charitable Foundation matched the impressive donation. The University of North Carolina General Administration Distinguished Professor Endowment Trust Fund will round out the endowment. The Jane Lewis Seaks Distinguished Professorship for Companion Animal Medicine will assure that the best professors are on board not only to care for VTH animals but to prepare tomorrow’s companion animal veterinarians, surgeons, and medical specialists for this rewarding profession.