BVU Alum Earns Rising Star Honor from Iowa Veterinary Medical Association
Iowa State University also bestows Outstanding Young Alumni award on Dr. Aubrey (Hauswirth) Cordray of Humboldt Veterinary Clinic, P.C.
Buena Vista University alum Dr. Aubrey (Hauswirth) Cordray in November earned the Outstanding Young Alumni Award from the Iowa State University College of Veterinary Medicine. Established in 2019, the Outstanding Young Alumni Award recognizes alumni who have excelled in the veterinary profession and/or provided service to their community 10 years or less after their DVM graduation.
The honor marked the second prestigious award the 2010 BVU graduate earned in recent months. In September, Dr. Cordray earned a Rising Star Award from the Iowa Veterinary Medical Association. Established in 2012, the Rising Star Award recognizes an IVMA member who graduated from veterinary school within the last seven years and has displayed outstanding accomplishments in veterinary research, private practice, regulatory services, civic activities, academia, and/or organized veterinary medicine.
“Any success we’ve achieved is due to the caring people surrounding us.”
Dr. Aubrey (Hauswirth) Cordray, 2010 BVU graduate
Additionally, Dr. Cordray’s team at Humboldt Veterinary Clinic, the practice she owns and operates with her husband, Kevin Cordray, was honored in 2021 by earning the IVMA’s Healthcare Team of the Year award.
“To earn two high honors in the past year on the heels of our team being recognized, it’s means more than I can express in words,” says Dr. Cordray. “I am so thankful for all the people who believed in me so strongly through the years.”
The Humboldt Veterinary Clinic, P.C., offers comprehensive, compassionate care to all animals. The clinic’s team of five veterinarians and supporting staff, numbering 22 in total, offers an array of services for companion animals, equine, cattle, and other large animals in a state-of-the-art facility on the western edge of Humboldt, a site that was renovated and expanded from 3,500 square feet to 13,000 square feet in a project that started in 2019 and concluded in May 2021. The majority of clients served by the Humboldt Veterinary Clinic come from a 30-mile radius surrounding Humboldt, but many come from further distances as well.
Cordray graduated from Pocahontas Area High School in 2006 and came to BVU with an interest in playing basketball for the Beavers and Coach Janet Berry while majoring in biology (pre-vet) and minoring in chemistry.
“Coach Berry’s dad was a veterinarian, so we connected on that level as well as through basketball,” says Cordray, who served as a team captain her senior year. “I had wanted to be a veterinarian ever since I was in elementary school.”
BVU Professor of Biology Dr. Rick Lampe served as Cordray’s advisor. She served as an intern at Lake Animal Hospital under the tutelage of Drs. A.A. Stepan and Dianne Johnson. She also interned two summers at Trans Ova Genetics in Sioux Center with Drs. Paul Van Roekel, Jon Schmidt, and Matt Bartlett.
Following her graduation from the ISU College of Veterinary Medicine in 2014, Cordray began her career under Dr. Jim Illg at the Humboldt Veterinary Clinic. Dr. Cordray and her husband, Kevin, purchased the practice in 2017 and Kevin took over the role of practice manager at that time.
“Dr. Illg had done a great job of being progressive,” she says. “I felt I could keep going with our up-to-date practices while benefitting from being in such a supportive community like Humboldt.”
In addition to building their business and serving their clients and team members, Dr. Aubrey and Kevin Cordray are the parents of two children: Hayes, 6, and Collins, 4.
“Any success we’ve achieved is due to the caring people surrounding us,” she says. “That includes our family, our amazing Humboldt Veterinary Clinic team, our clients, this community, and the wonderful people who impacted me on this journey through high school, at Buena Vista, and then through Iowa State. We are incredibly grateful.”