Hi EarlyEditionDude:
I am one of the applicants that took the February OAT during my junior year for regular admission.
The OAT is offered every year in February and October. You can find out the exact dates, and apply to take the test by getting an application from your school's counseling office.
Everyone will tell you to take the OAT when you are ready for it, which seems very ambiguous to me. When you decide to take the OAT, you have to think about when you actually want to apply for admission. There are different procedures if you want to apply early decision, regular admission w/ or w/o a bachelor's degree (to clarify, if you will have a bachelor's degree when you start optometry school), or if you plan to take a year off after getting your bachelor's degree.
If you are unsure about which school will allow you to begin optometry school without a bachelor's degree, you can look at this chart:
http://www.opted.org/pdf/2002_classprofile.pdf
I will be talking about taking the OAT when you are applying for regular admission. If you plan to apply without obtaining a bachelor's degree, you should contact the school and ask if they have any other requirements.
Generally, you should take the OAT the year before you plan to start optometry school. If you plan to start optometry school in Fall 2003, you should take either the Feb. or Oct. 2002 OAT. If you plan to start optometry school in Fall 2004, then you should take the OAT in 2003 - and so forth. You should not plan to take the OAT the same year you plan to be accepted into your school, such as, applying for the 2003 incoming class and taking the February 2003 OAT. Also, not all schools will accept the February OAT the same year you apply, since they will not receive your scores in time (again, look at that chart under Last OAT).
You will be applying for admission the year before you plan to get accepted (i.e. you apply the summer of 2002 to get accepted into the 2003 entering class), UNLESS you are applying early admission. Most schools start granting interviews as early as September/October, and all schools are on a rolling admission acceptance. That means if you decide to take the Feb. OAT for the same year you plan to get accepted (ex. Feb 2003 OAT for 2003 incoming class), your application would be put on hold until the school receives your scores. However, by the time the school receives your scores, there will be fewer seats available for them to offer to you. So what should you do? Plan ahead.
I took the Feb. 2002 OAT, and I'm applying for the incoming class of 2003. Here are the pros and cons of my decision.
Pro: By taking the Feb OAT, when I applied for optometry school during the summer, they had my OAT scores on file. They were able to offer me an interview right away. Since the schools I applied to had all my scores, application, and letters of recommendations - there was a higher chance that I could be accepted because I was ahead of everyone else.
Also, if I didn't do so well on my Feb. OAT, I could have still taken the Oct. test. I've spoken to the admission director from UCB, SCCO, and New England - all of them had told me that they would not reject an applicant right away if they had written down in their applications that they plan to take the Oct. OAT as well. For the other optometry schools, you'll have to contact them to know their policies (I'm almost sure that they are all the same).
In addition, I had the summer to work on my application and essays. My friends who decided to take the OAT in Oct of their senior year, they did not have the time to study and apply. I was able to complete almost all my interviews by now (January), and I had done my interview at ICO before the quarter began for me. It was also easier for me to plan how to do my interviews in the East Coast for SUNY and Newenco (I'm from CA), because I had prepared to have a light load during my fall quarter. My friends who took the OAT in Oct either applied late because they didn't have the time to work on their applications, or because they had too much to do during fall quarter (OAT, applications, getting letters of recommendations, etc). As a consequence, their files are only beginning to get reviewed now, or they have to wait for an opening for an interview because wait-lists are filled.
Even if you decide to take the OAT in Oct, it's SO important to APPLY EARLY!! All my applications were turned in the week that applications were accepted for the schools. Plus, many schools will grant you an interview although they have not received your OAT scores.
Con: Since I took the Feb. OAT, I was not able to finish the full year of physics that the OAT tested on. Fortunately, I took a test preparation course that prepared me fully for all the material in physics that I had not learned yet.
Also, you may not have finished some Biology classes if you plan to take the Feb. OAT. Again, I found the test prep course helped me out a lot.
I found myself really exhausted during the time I was studying for the OAT. I was taking a lot of units, and also volunteering and working at the same time. In addition, the test prep course demanded several hours a week from me, and every other week, we had to take a sample OAT on a Saturday.
My one big complaint is that I wished I had more time to study for the OAT. If I had planned to take the OAT in October, I would have the summer to study some more.
In short, plan with your academic counselor if you are still unsure when you should take the OAT. I'm obviously more partial into taking the Feb OAT because that is what I did, so try to get some more opinions before you decide anything.
I do have some bad news for you though. The final deadline to take the February 8, 2003 test was this Monday, January 13, 2003. However, if you do feel VERY prepared to take the Feb OAT, there is still one way you MAY be able to take it. On the day of the test, you have to go to one of the test centers (listed in the OAT application) with a $200 MONEY ORDER (NO personal checks), and you stand in a waiting list to see if they have an extra seat for you. My friend did this on the day I took the OAT, and she was able to take the test (after running over to Albertsons's to get a money order after they rejected her personal check, and running also running a stop sign which a police officer saw.. but that's another story).
Like I mentioned before, I mainly studied for the OAT by taking a test prep course.
I had taken the Hyperlearning (same as Princeton Review) prep course during the school year. Overall, I?m very pleased with the tutoring they provided. The instructors were very helpful, and knowledgeable in their respective subjects. I felt that the prep course really prepared me for the OAT, and made me study for the test a lot more than if I would have studied on my own.
However, I know prep courses are not cheap ? around $900. It did help that I received a $100 discount for being a member of the pre-optometry club. If you really can?t afford to spend that much money, I believe you can get the same amount of studying if you were really religious in studying for the OAT every single day for 2 hours, at least. There are OAT test guides offered through Princeton Review and Kaplan, which you can find at bookstores. If you could commit that amount of time every single day to study, you?ll do fine. However, you are more prone to slack off if you don?t have someone there to remind you to keep up with the material. If you could afford the prep course, I believe that it is a very good investment.
Also, try to take the prep course during the summer. It was a juggle for me to attend my regular school classes, work, volunteer, and go to the prep course at night (3x a week, 2 ? hrs. a meeting ? 4 meetings on select Saturdays to take a diagnostic test). If you can take the prep course during the summer, you can really focus your attention in that material.
Plus, try to attend an early session during the summer. This will give you some time to re-read the material, and prepare some more for the October OAT. However, if you take the first summer session course, you have to study the material when the class is done to prevent you from forgetting everything.
In addition, you still have to study on your own to keep up with the material. You can?t expect to only attend the prep course and get a good score without studying in your own time. The instructors do assign homework and reading, and you should try to attempt all the problems and read the material twice!
As you can tell, studying for the OAT will take up a lot of your time. It would be easier on you if you could take this class when you have the time to really concentrate on the material.
Ok, I hope I helped you out with your questions.
Best wishes,
Rosanna
