UNAM's AVMA accreditation, 2011 to 2025: what it means if you graduated inside the window

The short answer: the Facultad de Medicina Veterinaria y Zootecnia at UNAM held accreditation from the AVMA Council on Education from 2011 until the end of 2025. If you graduated inside that window, you are a graduate of an accredited veterinary college. That means no ECFVG and no PAVE. You go to the NAVLE and a state licence directly, on the same route a graduate of an American veterinary school takes.

The withdrawal was UNAM's own request and it applies going forward. It does not reach backwards and change where you graduated from.

Most graduates of those cohorts have never been told any of this. The pathway existed for fifteen years and was used by a very small number of people, not for lack of interest but because almost nobody knew it was there.

What the accreditation status actually removes

An internationally trained veterinarian normally has to complete an equivalency certification before a state licence is possible at all: the ECFVG, run by the AVMA, or the PAVE, run by the AAVSB. The certification verifies the education you already have. It does not add to it.

Graduates of AVMA-accredited programmes are exempt from that step. Accreditation is an administrative status held by your school, and it says nothing about you as a clinician, but it is the single fork in the road that changes a US timeline in years rather than months. Our guide to the requirements to work as a veterinarian in the US walks through the three separate things a licence actually depends on.

What the exemption is worth in 2026

The money moved sharply this year. For registrations after 1 January 2026 the ECFVG programme fee is $1,600, made up of a $700 application fee and a $900 quality assurance fee. The Basic and Clinical Sciences Examination adds $250. The Clinical Proficiency Examination, the hands-on final step, rose from $7,630 to $12,804 for the 2026 examination cycle, an increase of roughly $5,200 that the AVMA attributes to rising operating costs at the testing sites. It can be paid in two instalments, $1,000 and then $11,804.

Added up, that is close to $14,700 in official fees alone, before English language testing, before travel to a testing site, and before any preparation.

The queue is the harder cost. The Clinical Proficiency Examination is offered at two sites in the world, with roughly 250 full-examination seats a year against more than 2,000 veterinarians enrolled in the programme, figures cited by the United States Department of Justice in its December 2025 statement of interest. Waits run past a year, and most candidates fail at least one section and requeue for a retake.

None of that applies to you if you graduated from the FMVZ between 2011 and 2025.

What happened, and what it does not change

UNAM was granted full accreditation by the Council on Education in March 2011, after pursuing the status for close to fifteen years. In March 2025 the council approved the school's request to withdraw voluntarily, weeks before a scheduled comprehensive site visit to the Mexico City campus, and the notice was posted publicly in mid-April. The withdrawal took effect at the end of 2025. The school remains accredited in Mexico by CONEVET.

Cohorts graduating after the withdrawal no longer have the direct route. Cohorts who graduated during the accredited years did graduate from an accredited college, and state boards word the exemption around exactly that, whether the applicant graduated from an accredited college of veterinary medicine. Every board verifies its own applicants, so confirm your standing with the board in the state you are aiming at rather than assuming.

If you qualify, what the path looks like

Pass the NAVLE, the licensing examination administered by the ICVA and required by every state board. Our NAVLE guide covers the format, the testing windows and the retake rules.

Then the state licence, which is issued by an individual state and not nationally, so the state you choose changes both your start date and your paperwork. Then an offer from a clinic in the United States, and then the TN visa, the professional work visa created under the trade agreement between Mexico, the United States and Canada, in which veterinarian appears explicitly as an eligible profession. There is no lottery and no annual cap.

The full path typically runs 9 to 15 months. If you have already passed the NAVLE it moves considerably faster, because the longest step is behind you.

One thing worth being precise about: accreditation is assessed against your graduation year, and it is not the thing under time pressure. What is under time pressure is the market. Each year more veterinarians from the same cohorts find this route.

At VetBridge USA this is the profile we work with most. We confirm which route your degree puts you on, support NAVLE preparation with mentor veterinarians who have already passed it, and coordinate the state licence, the placement with a clinic and the TN process end to end.

Sources

Accreditation status, the accreditation and withdrawal dates, and the ECFVG steps and fees come from the American Veterinary Medical Association and its Council on Education. NAVLE format and testing windows come from the International Council for Veterinary Assessment. Clinical Proficiency Examination capacity and enrolment figures come from data cited by the United States Department of Justice in its December 2025 statement of interest. PAVE is administered by the American Association of Veterinary State Boards. Licensing requirements are set by each state board and should be verified directly with the state where you intend to practise.