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I went to a university with a LARGE and very good biology department, including field biology. We didn't really have herpetology a focus, though there was a class.
Honestly, just get into biology and get involved with a lab you like. I did work with the evolutionary biology lab and we had TONS of "teaching animals" that were really just the professor's very impressive herp collection.
Evolutionary biology is really hot right now with regard to cladistics and lizard/snake evolution. Phylogenetics is fundamentally changing our understanding of reptile taxonomy as well. If you really want to study reptiles but still have a viable scientific career beyond the title of "lizard king", go with one of the aforementioned fields with a reptilian emphasis. If you want to publish in obscure journals, maybe appear on a documentary if you're lucky, and languish away doing expensive and dirty field work half the year while begging for grants the other half... go for true herpetology.