Most of us can still remember what we wanted to grow up to be when we were very young. We dreamt of becoming pilots, firemen, movie stars, doctors, lawyers, or the President of the United States. Cesar Millan himself imagined one day becoming the finest dog trainer in the world. When Courtney Oliver was 7, her dream was to become a veterinary assistant. And just two weeks after her tenth birthday, she made that dream a reality.

Visiting the offices of Cesar Millan, Inc., Courtney appears bright and chipper. She moves from desk to desk sharing digital photos of her California vacation. Tomorrow she and her parents will go to Disneyland. She tells jokes. She sketches a quick picture of Jack Skellington from The Nightmare Before Christmas and signs it for us in the loops and dips of practiced cursive. She tells us that one day, she'd like to live on a farm, where she can raise a menagerie of her favorite animals.

"Praying mantises, hedgehogs, miniature goats, chickens, miniature cows... everything! We want everything. Clydesdales!"

Outwardly, she seems like an ordinary, precocious young girl - which, of course she is; but one who has already done something truly EXTRAordinary.

Her passion began as curiosity. Watching her own dogs' veterinarian and vet assistants move back and forth through the doors between the front office and the area beyond, she wondered what went on behind the scenes and longed to see for herself. The course that ultimately certified her for veterinary assistance took about 9 months to complete, and came after years of pleading with both her parents and the doctors at the vet's office, insisting that she could handle a job volunteering.

"So one day," Courtney recalls, "Dr. Shoemaker says to my mom, 'Ok, she wants to volunteer so badly? She can watch a surgery.' She tells me to go scrub up, and I go scrub up. And I think she was thinking that after I watched, I would never want to go to the vet again. But I left the operating room after the procedure, and I just said, 'oh, my god, when do I get to do that again?'"

The procedure was an ovariohysterectomy, ("just a big word for 'spay,'" Courtney says with a grin). Now 11, she regularly assists her mentor Dr. Shoemaker during surgical procedures, but will not be permitted to work alone in the OR until she's older and finished with her undergraduate work (which she can officially begin when she's 15 or 16). She's been invited to appear on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, where she was awarded a substantial future scholarship, and she also runs her own website, CourtneysCritters.com, where she offers photos, informative articles, and advice to kids.

"Just go for it," she says when asked about following your dreams, "it's great to start early. If you start early, then you have plenty of time to do what you want to do. I want adults to really start to see that kids have this potential. Most people are like, 'Oh, you're too young,' but kids have this amazing potential. Go for it. Follow your dreams. If you want it, go get it."