nyclady12 Posted January 27, 2013 Share Posted January 27, 2013 Hello All, I have a problem and I am looking for advice and suggestions on how to improve my situation. I am a recent college graduate with a liberal arts degree. I was always interested in medicine. I was pre-med during my first year of college, but dropped it due to not getting good grades. So I changed my focus of study to a useless liberal arts degree that is not getting me a job. After completing college, I am more mature now with better study habits. Medical school will be a much longer road so that is why I am considering PA. I will still practice medicine either way. I also understand that PA school is also rigorous and difficult to get into, but if successful it will be shorter to complete. Anyway, I am working as a cashier part time in retail where they will probably lay me off soon b/c I am not getting many customers to sign up for their store credit card. I can't continue living like this working for very little money and applying for jobs with no response. I want a career that I love that will give me PRACTICAL skills. A general degree is a waste of time and doesn't cut it anymore in a time where many people have college degrees. Anyway, enough of my rant. I just wanted to give you all a little background of my situation. I would like to know if anyone here did a career switch to PA from something else and how they did it. Where can I take courses. I thought of doing a 2nd bachelors degree in biology and then applying to PA school. I am also worried about getting a loan as I have bad credit and my parents also don't have good enough credit to cosign me for a loan. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated thank you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
briepm Posted January 27, 2013 Share Posted January 27, 2013 I was a sociology major - it doesn't really matter what your undergrad degree is. There are tons of threads on this forum for people in your same situation. To sum up: 1). Your liberal arts degree is fine, you just need great grades in your science classes and an over all GPA of AT LEAST 3.2 (some would say 3.0 but that is pushing it) 2). You need health care experience - hundreds if not thousands of hours of direct patient care. See any of the zillions of threads about what counts as HCE (health care experience) 3). Don't worry about a second bachelors - that's not necessary. Take your classes at a community college or a 4 year school near you. 4). Loans - shouldn't be a problem - fill out the FAFSA and you can get federal money to at least cover tuition. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrator rev ronin Posted January 27, 2013 Administrator Share Posted January 27, 2013 Basically, if you're interested in medicine, you still have at least as good a chance to get into medical school as you do into PA school. You have Caribbean, DO, and DPM options available to you as well as straight MD school Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderator EMEDPA Posted January 27, 2013 Moderator Share Posted January 27, 2013 Caribbean is becoming a serious risk as US residency slots are getting harder to gt every year. I would go DO way before Carib.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NJlovesPA Posted January 28, 2013 Share Posted January 28, 2013 Don't take class at community college because now a lot of school require higher science classes need to be at 4-year institution ( microbio, biochem,orgochem...) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrator rev ronin Posted January 28, 2013 Administrator Share Posted January 28, 2013 Don't take class at community college because now a lot of school require higher science classes need to be at 4-year institution ( microbio, biochem,orgochem...) Any data to back up that assertion? My experience is quite the opposite: none of the PA programs I looked at required any coursework be done at 4 year institutions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NJlovesPA Posted January 28, 2013 Share Posted January 28, 2013 Any data to back up that assertion? My experience is quite the opposite: none of the PA programs I looked at required any coursework be done at 4 year institutions. I should say "preferably" . I do remember those school I looked into just past year prefer the upper level science courses 300+ should be at 4- year institutions. I can't recall as much now but Suny Downstate is one example if you check their admission requirements. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BroncoPAS Posted January 28, 2013 Share Posted January 28, 2013 Any data to back up that assertion? My experience is quite the opposite: none of the PA programs I looked at required any coursework be done at 4 year institutions. Some schools specify "upper level _______" which means 300+ level courses. Most of the community colleges I'm familiar with only offer 99-299 level courses. It varies widely by program. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
patachok Posted February 16, 2013 Share Posted February 16, 2013 Don't take class at community college because now a lot of school require higher science classes need to be at 4-year institution ( microbio, biochem,orgochem...) I am not sure this statement if fully true. I applied to 5 schools, 4 in Chicago (serious admissions reqs), and none of the schools required prereq done at a 4 year University. I am taking my Micro at a community college. Just check with each school individually... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenmood Posted February 16, 2013 Share Posted February 16, 2013 Caribbean is becoming a serious risk as US residency slots are getting harder to gt every year. I would go DO way before Carib.... Agreed. I had a recent clinical with a bunch of students from Caribbean schools and they are **** out of luck, from the way they talk. All of them regret it. Almost no chance of any competitive residencies. I had no idea it was like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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