The equine industry in the United States is a growing, dynamic sector of agriculture with a broad spectrum of jobs expanding within the industry. The Equine Management program is designed to provide the students with the basic skills and background knowledge necessary for entry level employment as trainers and assistant trainers in the horse industry.
Students applying to the program must go through an oral interview and a practical riding test before admission to the program is granted. These are scheduled between November and March of the year prior to admission into the program. We suggest that the prospective students apply to Northeastern Junior College first, and then try to schedule a campus visit along with their interview and riding test.
In Northeastern's horse training portion of the program, freshman students are assigned young horses that have already been started. Many of these horses have already been through our colt starting class here at Northeastern. The second semester of the freshman year and both semesters of the sophomore year, students will start and train a young horse themselves. These young horses are sent to us from a large geographic area as well as members of our local community. We treat our program as if it were a training facility. Our students are responsible for general care of their assigned horses on a daily basis including billing and any health care that is necessary. We are proud of the great reputation of our colt starting program. This reputation allows us to continually provide quality horses for our students to advance their skills.
Our two year program provides students access to the business, economic, technical and general education classes necessary to become competent managers. Practical experience is provided in many of the classes as well as the internship portion of the program.
It is very important to us here at NJC that we provide a positive internship experience. We try to direct our students to an internship sponsor with a great history and a strong background working with students. In many cases these internship opportunities result in long-term employment.
For more information contact: Cole Briggs - cole.briggs@njc.edu or 970-521-6785.
Program Learning Outcomes:
- Students will understand appropriate tools, tack and attire associated with the western horse training industry.
- Students will understand industry accepted methods of ground work with horses, including but not limited to: catching, haltering, leading, longeing, and grooming.
- Students will understand industry accepted methods of saddling, mounting and riding young horses within the first 90 days of training. This includes, but is not limited to: commonly accepted drills related to training horses with a western riding foundation.
- Students should be able to understand the terminology associated with the western horse. This includes but not limited to: common names of equine body parts, common names of tack, and commonly accepted horse training terminology.
- Students will be able to understand normal horse health, body condition, normal vital signs, common unsoundness, common illness, normal preventative healthcare and nutrition. This includes procedure for feeding appropriate volumes of forage, concentrates and water required by the horse.
- Students will be able to understand common industry accepted equine reproduction techniques, practices, and terminology.
- Student will be able to understand basic and common equine business practices, including but no limited to: creating a business plan, creating a marketing plan, creating cover letters and resumes as well as understand the economic impact of the horse industry in the United States and World Wide.
- Students will properly communicate the above terminology and skills in a professional manner.
