volunteer experience

[heyhey20]

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hey, i just have a quick question. Does volunteering for an optometrist in your school's health center count as optometrist shadowing experience? I don't have any experience in optometry and i'm just looking around to see what qualifies. thanks.

 

[iiiimonica]

yes that would count.

but to everyone applying without experience, the reason some schools (and all schools should) require shadowing experience is so that you can be really really sure that optometry is for you. can you be really really sure after shadowing just 1 od? i don't think so, try to shadow at least 3 different od's in different settings (private, retail and hospital/VA) to get the real picture.

good luck to all

 

[aam0050]

Shadowing optometrists or working for them will make or break your enthusiasm for the career. I knew I was interested in optometry, but it wasn't until I began shadowing that I became estatic about my possibilities. Now I work for a couple practices as a tech and I can't think of anything else I rather do but attend optometry school and become an optometrist. I'm sure this is the same feeling for many of us future ODs 🙂

Definitely check out different settings like monica mentioned! They are ALL different, and what you see first might not strike you as that interesting (happened to me,) just know that's not how all practices run.

Good luck. 😀