Applying to PT school

[amyschacht]

Just looking for a little advice I suppose..
I'm a junior, majoring in Health Science. I have a 3.0 GPA and plan on retaking physics this summer because I got a D. I have one year left and am trying my best to raise my GPA. I haven't taken the GRE yet, but plan to this summer. I am volunteering/observing PT at a hospital right now. I was thinking about taking a year off after undergrad to get more experience in the field, maybe a PT tech?
I'm really worried about getting into grad school based on my GPA. A lot of the classes that brought it down are not prerequisites for the program ( organic chemistry..)
Any advice? Words of wisdom?
By the way: I am from Illinois if anyone has attended a PT school here.

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[RizDPT]

Just looking for a little advice I suppose..
I'm a junior, majoring in Health Science. I have a 3.0 GPA and plan on retaking physics this summer because I got a D. I have one year left and am trying my best to raise my GPA. I haven't taken the GRE yet, but plan to this summer. I am volunteering/observing PT at a hospital right now. I was thinking about taking a year off after undergrad to get more experience in the field, maybe a PT tech?
I'm really worried about getting into grad school based on my GPA. A lot of the classes that brought it down are not prerequisites for the program ( organic chemistry..)
Any advice? Words of wisdom?
By the way: I am from Illinois if anyone has attended a PT school here.

I know exactly how you feel. I am in exactly the same position you are. I too am a junior in Illinois volunteering at a hospital and I have a 3.0 prerequisite GPA.

Every year there are people like us who get into at PT program. There's no reason that can't be us. (At least that's what I keep telling myself).

 

[PTapp]

amyschacht, Just FYI, there's a newly formed Pre-PT Forum on SDN now. So next time make sure that you post anything related to getting into PT school there.

I would repeat some classes, gain some experience in the field as a PT Aide and study really hard for the GREs. Give yourself at least 3 months to study for the GREs. Good luck.

 

[jbizzle]

Move to the Pre-PT forum.

I took 1 year off after graduating to get experience hours and study hard for the GRE. I had a sub 3.0 GPA BTW, so just depending on where you want to apply, you can definitely get into a school. You just have to research on which school you can get accepted to.

Speaking of Illinois, I got an interview at Rosalind Franklin, but then I got rejected (I think it's because I spilled listerine on my shirt that I didn't notice until my interview was over, no wonder why I was getting weird looks or maybe it was my low ass GPA)

Anyway....

* keep up that 3.0 GPA

* get solid LORs and write a good essay (for schools that don't interview)

* with the experience hours; it's quality not quantity (trust me on this one, they asked me during one of my interviews) Try to get hours in different settings, just because your a PT-tech and can get thousands of hours in that ONE setting, dont think it will be fine. You can still observe other setting while working as a PT tech

 

[Yohan]

* keep up that 3.0 GPA

* get solid LORs and write a good essay (for schools that don't interview)

* with the experience hours; it's quality not quantity (trust me on this one, they asked me during one of my interviews) Try to get hours in different settings, just because your a PT-tech and can get thousands of hours in that ONE setting, dont think it will be fine. You can still observe other setting while working as a PT tech

What he said...

and I would shoot for around 1100 on the GRE to offset your GPA. I also was accepted this fall with a sub 3.0 overall GPA, so it can be done! A tech job would be a wise decision in my opinion because it puts you in a PT environment 40 hours/week. That will help come LOR, essay, and interview time

 

[Svfina]

Speaking of Illinois, I got an interview at Rosalind Franklin, but then I got rejected (I think it's because I spilled listerine on my shirt that I didn't notice until my interview was over, no wonder why I was getting weird looks or maybe it was my low ass GPA)

Lol!

 

[DancerFutureDPT]

To OP Amy...

1) I'm from Illinois as well. holla! (wow, did I really just say "holla"?!?! It's been a long day)
2) Do a quick calculation of your GPA with just the prerequisite classes...that will give you a little bit of a better look at where you stand, since you said some of your GPA downers were from orgo and other non-prereq classes (although a D in physics is going to hurt a bit).

PTCAS calculates not only your regular GPA, but your GPA of just the classes you list as prereqs. That's kind of nice, because you can pick and choose (i.e. if you got a C in development psych, and an A in intro and a B in abnormal, and you have to have 2 psych classes for prereqs but it doesn't specify which type of psych classes, you can pick the ones with the 2 highest grades to give your prereq GPA a bit of a boost). I played that game a lot when selecting my "social science" classes I wanted to count by choosing ones that I did better in and still met the prereq requirement.

But you do still have another year, so just do what you can to boost up your GPA as much as possible (without taking really stupid classes just for the purpose of boosting your grades) and retake the prereq classes where you didn't do too hot. Don't worry too much about things like organic chem/biochem/etc., because they're not required for PT school. It'd be nice if you did well in them, but that's probably not going to make or break your app.