AASV Foundation Announces Recipients of Hogg Scholarship

March 21, 2018 — 

Drs Jose Angulo, Angela Baysinger and Amanda Sponheim were named the 2018 recipients of the American Association of Swine Veterinarians Foundation Hogg Scholarship. Mary Lou Hogg presented the scholarships during the American Association of Swine Veterinarian's 49th Annual Meeting in San Diego, CA.

Established in 2008, the scholarship is named for Dr. Alex Hogg who was a leader in swine medicine and pursued a master's degree in veterinary pathology after 20 years in a mixed-animal practice. The scholarship is awarded annually to an AASV member who has been accepted into a qualified graduate program to further his or her education after years as a swine practitioner.

Dr Jose Angulo earned his Doctor of Veterinary Medicine and Zootechnics from the Instituto Tecnologico de Sonora in 2001. Following graduation, he joined Grupo SOLES based in Sonora, Mexico where he served as the Production & Health Planning and Development Coordinator. Since leaving Grupo SOLES in 2004, Angulo has since worked in swine technical services for Boehringer Ingelheim, ELANCO Animal Health, and Zoetis where he is currently the managing veterinarian specializing in PRRS. He plans to apply the Hogg Scholarship to help fund his master's program at the University of Minnesota College of Veterinary Medicine. His research project is under Dr Montserrat Torremorell and it focuses on PRRSV incidence in growing pigs and factors that drive infections in wean to finish farms.

Dr Angela Baysinger earned her Doctor of Veterinary Medicine in 1992 from the University of Missouri-Columbia College of Veterinary Medicine where she graduated Summa Cum Laude. Following graduation, Baysinger accepted an associate veterinary position at Sutton Veterinary Clinic in Sutton, Nebraska. She left practice in 1995 to earn a master's degree in epidemiology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln while serving as the interim state swine extension veterinarian. Baysinger has since worked as a swine technical services veterinarian with ALPHARMA and Boehringer Ingelheim interspersed with a short stint as a self-employed swine consultant and two and a half years as a Health Assurance Veterinarian with Pig Improvement Company. Her interest in focusing on animal welfare arose during her 7 years (2000-2007) as Vice President of On-farm Food Safety and Animal Welfare at Farmland Foods. Her expertise in welfare continues in her current role as Director of Animal Welfare for all species at Merck Animal Health. Baysinger plans to pursue a Master's Degree in Animal Welfare, Ethics and Law at the University of Edinburgh through a distance learning program followed by pursuit of board certification in the American College of Animal Welfare.

After receiving her Doctor of Veterinary Medicine in 2008 from the University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine, Dr Amanda Sponheim spent two years as a Health Assurance Veterinarian with Pig Improvement Company. In 2010, she joined Boehringer Ingelheim where she serves today as Strategic Account Technical Services Veterinarian. Sponheim began her Master's degree program at the University of Minnesota College of Veterinary Medicine in 2016 under the guidance of Dr Maria Pieters. She is focusing on three thesis projects addressing industry knowledge gaps related to diagnostic approaches for detection of M. hyopneumoniae in low and high prevalence scenarios. She plans to apply the Hogg Scholarship funds to the completion of this program.