Spring 2025 Equine Internship

The Kentucky Equine Management Internship (KEMI) offers a comprehensive educational experience for students enrolled for academic credit through a sponsoring college or university, or for recent graduates of such institutions.

 Interns are employed full-time on prestigious Thoroughbred farms in the Lexington, Kentucky area, attend weekly lectures focused on expanding their knowledge of the Thoroughbred racing industry, and attend local industry events to network with industry professionals. KEMI offers two internship sessions each year. The 22-week Spring session provides opportunities for interns to learn about the commercial breeding of Thoroughbreds. The 24-week Fall session focuses primarily on sales and marketing. KEMI has provided these opportunities for 23 years and has provided internship opportunities to more than 1,000 interns from all fifty states and twenty-one foreign countries. As a result of their participation, nearly 100% of attendees find permanent employment within the equine industry upon completion of the program.

The KEMI program is for students who are interested in jobs related to the equine industry, particularly those related to horse racing. Interns live and work (and get paid) on Central Kentucky Thoroughbred farms and attend weekly lectures related to industry issues. The work is hands-on with horses (cleaning stalls, grooming, feeding, etc.) The lectures relate to what is happening on the farms and within the industry. This internship opportunity seeks to improve the horse-handling skills of the interns and give them the opportunity to learn about the operation and management of commercial Thoroughbred farms. We request that applicants have at least basic horse handling experience, excellent references, some knowledge of production agriculture (have taken courses or grown up around agriculture or livestock), and have at least a 2.0 GPA. Interns are supervised by the KEMI Program Coordinator.