Voicemail day. You asked, I answered.

This one covers four things that come up constantly. Whether a withdrawal on your transcript is going to sink you. When in the cycle you should actually apply. What applying really costs once you add it all up. And how to build a study schedule that survives contact with real life.

On withdrawals, short answer: one or two won't end you. A pattern of them will raise questions. Address it briefly, own it, move on. Do not spend a paragraph of your personal statement explaining a W.

On cost, budget more than you think. Application fees, transcripts, supplementals, and interview travel add up fast, and nobody warns you about the supplementals.

What I answer:

• How to handle withdrawals and bad grades in your application
• When to apply in the cycle and why early matters
• What applying to PA school actually costs
• Building a study schedule for prereqs and for PA school
• How to prioritize when everything feels urgent
• Whether to reapply or wait a year

Resources:

Free Application Timeline: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/free-application-timeline

CASPA GPA Calculator: https://www.thepaplatform.com/pa-school-caspa-gpa-calculator

Supplemental Application Library: https://www.thepaplatform.com/supplemental-library

Pre-PA Counseling: https://www.thepaplatform.com/services/pre-pa-counseling

Mentioned in this episode:

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Its voicemail day.

Did you know that you could leave a message for the podcast to have it answered here?

We do these episodes every so often and I have some questions to answer today that I think you'll enjoy.

Welcome to the Pre PA Club Podcast.

If you want to learn how to become a physician assistant, you're in the right place.

I'm your host, Savannah Perry.

Let's get to it.

Hey guys, Savannah Perry here, your host of the Pre PA Club podcast and creator of the PA platform.

Thank you for joining me for this solo episode, which I don't do that often since I have so many cool people to interview.

But today's episode will be answering some voicemail questions.

So I guess not completely alone because you will hear those questions and some of these were very good and I think will actually be longer solo episodes or videos or blog posts because I actually want to go way more in depth with them.

But the link to submit a question, if you would like to, is in the description.

It's just speakpipe.com thepaplatform and we'll be sharing that on social media as well so that you can leave a voicemail question for the podcast.

Coming up in the new year, we'll be having a lot more Q and A stuff on Instagram, in the Prepa Club Facebook group, and on the podcast.

So make sure you get your questions in so we can go ahead and start working on those episodes and getting your answers.

But for a little overview and outline of what is going to be covered, we're going to talk about grades and withdrawals, specifically in your personal statement and how and when to address those.

And then we are going to talk about creating a study schedule and that will be helpful for either undergrad or PA school.

And then we're going to talk about when to apply if you maybe aren't sure if you're ready or not, and deciding when's the best time to go ahead and apply.

And then money.

So I've been talking about finances a lot on the podcast, so this was a great question about how much to save, save for the application cycle.

And that one specifically, I think needs its own attention, but we'll address it here.

All of these I will link in the description blog post that are relevant and go into way more detail about this stuff so that you can find that.

And you know, if you relate to one of these and need more information, check those resources out or contact me on social media and we'll dive in a little bit more.

All right, so I'm going To let you hear the first voicemail and then we'll start doing some Q and A.

I was just listening to one of Your Q&As about talking about grades and your personal statement, like if you had any bad grades.

And as of right now I don't have any Cs.

I got two Bs and they were both during like pandemic when everything was online.

So I don't know if I should talk about that in my personal statement because like that had an effect on my grades or if I should just not bring it up because a lot of schools still accept Bs and they have no problem with them.

And second question, I had to drop organic chemistry so I got a W, so it doesn't affect my gpa.

I don't know like what aspect of that they can see.

So should I bring that up or just not?

Because I'm taking it again and I'm hopefully going to do good.

So should I just not talk about the drop of Orgo?

Thank you.

Okay.

I love talking about personal statements and I've said it a million times.

Your personal statement is what gets you the interview and then your interview is what will get you accepted into PA school.

It is a very, very common concern to know or wonder what should I be putting in my personal statement?

What is worth devoting space to, especially when space is limited.

Because in your personal statement you will only have those 5,000 characters, including spaces to explain why you want to be a PA that's about a page and a paragraph, single spaced.

So that's not a lot of space.

And you could devote a lot of time to going into grades, mistakes, red flags.

And the question becomes should you and when is that important to do?

That's what this question is asking.

In reference to the grades and to withdrawals.

I will just go ahead and tell you my rule of thumb.

I'm going to pull some of this from my book, the Physician Assistant School Personal Statement Guide or the PA School Personal Statement Guide.

And you can get that on Amazon or the PA platform.com if you are working on your personal statement and need more help with kind of figuring these things out and not being sure you know what you should talk about or when or where to put in your essay.

The book can definitely help you a ton.

And don't forget to use that code future PA if you do get it through the website.

Alright, I'm just going to read this section.

If you have the book, it's on page 29 and it is called Addressing Red flags, and then we'll talk about grades Specifically.

A rule of thumb when deciding if application issues need to be addressed in your essay comes down to a single question.

Would insert issue potentially prevent me from getting an interview?

If the answer is yes, include it.

If not, use your supplemental essays or interviews as an opportunity to address the issue.

Some red flags I get questions about include low GPAs, low grades, test scores, lack of experience, misdemeanors, and gaps in education or work.

Be assured, if you meet the requirements a program is asking for, you are automatically a competitive applicant.

There's no place in your application for self degradation when it comes to grades I consider low as C or below.

But use discernment in deciding whether to include an explanation of every grade.

A few blips with an overall upward trend likely won't have much effect on your potential of securing an interview.

If you had significant struggles with a certain course or semester, briefly include a statement about efforts you made and beneficial lessons.

Typically, a gap in education or experience won't need an explanation unless there are particular circumstances you would like to include.

And then in the back of the book there are essay examples that have specific essays with low grades, low gpa, and showing how to address that properly.

So with this question, you know, if going back to that rule of thumb, if it looks like it's something that you think a school would say, hey, they got this bad grade or they had this withdrawal, we don't think we should give them an interview.

It's worth explaining in your personal statement, but don't devote too much space to it.

This shouldn't be what you start with right out of the gate.

And there's more in the book about it.

It should be later on in your essay, towards the end.

You don't want to make excuses, you just want to be very upfront with it.

If you're talking about B's, I would not think you need to address that.

What you do want to try to include is point pointing out your strengths and the positive things in your essay that make you a great candidate for that PA program.

A couple withdrawals, probably not a big deal if you had a whole semester that was just rough, lots of withdrawals, lots of bad grades, you know, stuff was going on.

Whatever happened, that may be worth addressing.

A lot of schools will give you that opportunity in supplemental applications too.

So that's also a consideration where you may not need to include something in your personal statement because you'll have that opportunity later as well.

So I hope that answers your question and we will move on to question number two.

Yeah, I'm wondering if you can do.

A.

Section on creating like a, I.

Guess a study schedule or study plan,.

I guess, that you would use to study each day.

All right, I know this tone well, and this to me sounds like either an overwhelmed, just started PA student or someone who is about to start PA school and kind of in that freaking out phase.

Totally normal.

We have all been there and PA school is a new beast.

If you can figure out your study skills, learning style and study plan before PA school, that will be a huge benefit.

I'm going to link some blog posts in the description I've done recently about kind of finding your learning style, finding what resources work for you, and developing those study plans.

I think I did a podcast episode on it as well, so we'll try to link that.

But you know, in PA school and everywhere, everywhere like undergrad, you need to be able to pivot and adjust very quickly and recognize when you're struggling.

So you can go into it with a plan.

You can know I'm a note taker or I'm a group studier, or I use these types of resources and make that your initial plan.

But if you see at any point that that's not working for you, you got to figure out a new plan.

And part of that will be using the people around you as resources as well.

Use your classmates.

Let them know if you are struggling.

Your advisors, your teachers, TAS tutors, make the most out of everything you have at your disposal.

And so if that means seeking out more help and seeking out different resources, that's fine.

You may not get everything you need out of a lecture, and that may be you don't.

You know, I want to say jive, jive with the professor's style or the testing style is not what you're used to.

You don't do great just sitting in front of a PowerPoint.

You need more application or you need video.

And there are all these different learning types.

There's audio, there's visual, there's what else is there?

Reading and writing.

And so you really just want to identify that for yourself.

There are tons of free tests online where you can actually, you know, go through some questions and figure out what your learning style is that works best and then practice and figure out what that actually looks like.

The other thing I would say about figuring out a study schedule is number two, when you find something that works, stick to it.

There can be some pressure to do what your classmates are doing or what your friends are doing.

Even if you know that doesn't work for you.

So don't feel like you need to be a group studier if you're not a group studier.

I know I don't study well in groups.

Someone talking at me or me trying to explain something I don't really understand yet doesn't click with my brain.

It doesn't work.

I know that.

What I did know going into PA school was that I like to write things out and take notes and see it and organize it.

But then what I found in anatomy when we started in the summer was there wasn't time.

I couldn't physically, with the time I had available, do the study methods I had previously done in undergrad.

So I had to adjust.

And that meant doing a lot more on the computer, taking notes.

I feel like everyone now has fancy iPads, which I'm super jealous of, and think I need one even though I'm not in school.

But, you know, figure out what that's gonna look like for you to be more effective and more efficient.

One thing that I then later found in PA school, once we got into clinical medicine, was application.

And using qbanks that had explanations of both right and wrong answers were very effective for me to make sure I understood the information.

I think I've always been someone who can memorize well, but in a lot of these classes, memorization is not going to work.

And that's what I found in some of my undergrad classes, especially getting into some of those more difficult chemistries.

I think that's why those were hard for me, because I was trying to rely on just learn the material, memorize it real quick, and then forget it.

And that doesn't work.

You have to actually try to understand it and make it click.

And then once you're in PA school, you're learning things that are going to affect someone else's life and a patient.

And you know, that is something you can't take lightly.

And so you do have to make an effort to really learn that information.

So for me, that was finding application methods and using QBanks and books that let me do that and sticking with those resources and the routine once I found it.

The last thing I want to say about this, to answer briefly, is when you're making a study schedule, it does not have to mean that you study 24 7.

That doesn't mean you're going to do better in the classes if you don't take any personal time at all to take take care of yourself.

And I've actually talked to Students and worked with students where this was very detrimental to them and even led to dropping out of PA school because they just got so wrapped up in school that their mental health declined greatly.

So if you need help, ask for help.

If you know working out is a great thing for you, do that.

That's something I've actually just recently discovered.

If I wake up and work out, my day is infinitely better than if I don't.

And so, you know, find those things that work for you.

If that is cooking is a release for you.

If there's a show you like to watch, watching a show for 30 minutes or an hour once a week is not going to be a big deal.

Now don't go binging.

What's that show?

I watched the oc I started that finals week of freshman year of the spring semester thanks to my roommate Emma.

She will never hear this, but shout out to Emma for doing that to me.

Don't do that.

It's not the time to binge watch a show, but if you need a little break, that's okay.

And so you have to learn that.

I may have talked about it before here, but When I started PA school, I felt like I had to study 24 7.

I would wake up at 5am, get ready, go to school, get there by 6 6, and studied from 6 to 8 until we started classes.

We would have a lunch break after school was over.

I would go home, sit at the kitchen table.

I lived with my parents during didactic year and I would just study until I went to bed.

And then I would take a textbook with me or notes to bed and just read them until I fell asleep.

Guys, that was not healthy.

I, you know, remember a breaking point.

The second some semester of PA school.

It was the fall semester.

We were in the middle of our orthopedic section, which I hate orthopedics anyway, and we were trying to learn physical exam.

We went into small group one week, which was four of us.

There were four girls in my small group with my advisor and favorite teacher.

And she just said, hey guys, how are y' all doing?

Like, how are y' all handling everything?

And I, I just said, I was very honest.

I was like, ah, last night I just cried.

I sat at my dining room table and cried.

Everyone else in my group was like, me too.

That's about where I'm at.

And so you're gonna have those moments of overwhelm.

They're going to pass.

And you have to use your classmates to get through them.

But then third semester of PA school came around and we were actually doing a little bit more difficult things.

So cardiology, pulmonology, hemoc, some of these subjects that are a little tougher.

But I started loosening up a little bit.

I would actually go to dinner with my parents when they asked instead of saying I needed to stay home and study, even though I did need to eat dinner.

I would take some breaks, watch some shows, go to the gym with my classmates, and I started doing better on my test.

And I had this mindset shift of, okay, well, studying for these 30 minutes or an hour after my brain is exhausted, my body's exhausted, I've been sitting in lecture from 8 to 5.

Will I do that much better.

Will this be the difference in me getting a 95 and a 87 or is this the difference in me getting a 94 and a 95?

And so you have to kind of think about those things and realize that you cannot physically study every second of every day and that's okay.

So those are my short 2 cents.

Again, we'll put some videos and blogs in the description that go into that a little bit more.

And now we'll move on to our next question.

So this question is.

I think this is something that maybe advisors don't really know how to help with and you know, it can be a struggle for this next one.

So let's hear the question and then we'll get into it.

It do you think it's more beneficial to apply when you're not 100% confident in your application if it just barely meets the minimum requirements for PA school, just to get that extra application cycle under your belt, to show commitment towards PA school with anticipation of building up your resume within that next year?

Or do you think you should hold off on that and only apply when you're 100% confident in your application?

You have built up your resume.

This is such a great question and I think everyone who has applied to PA school has this thought at some point.

I have three things I want to say about this, so number one, you will never feel ready.

I don't think I've worked with a single pre PA student or somebody applying to PA school who goes, I think my application is killer and awesome and I know 100% I'm going to get interviews and going to get accepted.

That just doesn't happen.

And I can look at applications that I think are amazing and those people still don't feel that way.

And this is such a gray process.

There is very little black and white and so it's very Hard to say, you know, yes, you're ready.

I get messages all day long.

You know, these are my stats.

This is my situation.

What do you think?

And I know people want me to say, yeah, you're a shoe, and you'll definitely get in.

But I can't say that because I have seen people with 4.0s not get accepted their first year.

And I've seen people with thousands of hours not get accepted their first year.

There has to be that perfect mix of what your application looks like, where you're applying, and whether that's a great fit on both sides.

So you will never feel ready, and that's okay.

When you push submit, most likely you will not feel 100% confident in your application.

Number two, my rule of thumb of deciding when to apply is if you meet the minimum requirements for a program, go ahead and submit.

So if you can look at their requirements and you say, I have all of these grades.

I have these GPAs, I have the test scores I need.

I have the experience, I have the shadowing, whatever, go ahead and do it.

Because that means in the eyes of that program, you are a competitive applicant.

Doesn't 100% mean you'll get in?

But at least your application will be looked at.

If you don't meet those requirements of a program, they're not going to see your application.

And so it would be a waste of your time and money to submit.

Granted, I did that.

I applied to two programs that I felt I knew I wasn't qualified for.

The time I submitted my application, I only had maybe 250 hours of experience.

So I knew that wasn't going to happen.

Emory sent me an instant rejection, which is funny because I've interviewed the admissions director now, and I've met him, and he's so, so nice.

And I. I gave him a hard time.

I was like, y' all didn't want me, but it's okay.

And then the other school actually did email me and said, hey, will you have a thousand hours by this date?

I said no, and then received my rejection.

And I also want you to realize rejection is just part of this process.

I don't know of really a single.

They're out there.

I know they are, but I have not frequently heard of someone who does not experience rejection during this process and get a rejection from at least one program.

It just happens.

That's something you kind of have to be ready for, know is a possibility.

But if you feel ready and you meet those requirements, go for it.

The third thing is keep working on your application, even when you submit, until you have that acceptance and you've submitted your deposit, keep going and keep pushing towards improving your application.

Take a good, honest look at it and see the areas that you need to improve.

I recently got a message that was, you know, I've applied to PA school.

I keep getting rejections.

I know my grades and GPA are low, but I keep working on my experience and getting more, and it's really good.

What can I do?

And I kind of said, you know, you told me what you need to do.

Your grades and your GPA are lower.

And so that tells me that that's what you need to work on if that's what you've identified.

So identify those weaknesses, even if it's not the area that you would prefer to work on and start, you know, seeing what you can do to improve that.

If you do hear back from schools and get a rejection or wait list, at that point, you can reach out to those schools and see if they have any feedback for you.

All right, let's move on to our last question about saving money for the application cycle.

Hi, Savannah, this is a pre PA student coming to you.

As someone who wants to apply soon, I wanted to know relatively, how much should someone save for the application cycle?

If you could go into a video, like, explaining, like, the various different costs outside of, you know, obviously tuition, stuff like that, like, what should someone.

What would be like, a good amount for someone to save, let's say, like, per school that they're applying to?

So, like, some supplemental fees, travel fees, what else?

The different things to send, the transcripts, the different costs to send transcripts and to apply.

Like how, Like, I don't even know how much to save or around how much to save.

So I guess I know every school is a little bit different, but what would be like, a safe amount to save, like, say, per school that someone is applying to beforehand?

So that, you know, we could kind of keep that in mind.

All right, great question here.

And I'm going to link in the description to a guest post from one of our coaches, Jamie, who did a post on the unexpected expenses of interviewing and attending PA school.

And I'm going to pull a lot of information from.

From her post.

But before we get into that, there are fees and a lot of cost related to this process.

So that is something you can start saving for and thinking about ahead of time.

Before we get into cost, I do want to Say use your resources.

That's something I don't see students doing as much as I think they should.

So if you're in classes anywhere, see if there's a writing center or tas or pre, pre health prepa advisors who can help you with some things.

You know, they're not PAs, so take their advice, maybe with a grain of salt, but know that you know it's not going to hurt anything just to see what's available to you.

And also there are fee waivers for some of these things like testing and CASPA where if you depend on tax income status for the the previous year you have to submit all that you can get some waivers.

And so that's something that you want to look into and try for.

But that does take some strategic timing and planning.

So with this, let's just talk kind of general stuff and just know if you're listening to this in the future.

This can change between cycles.

But as of right now, Caspa charges 179 for the first program you apply to and then 55 for each additional programs.

And then schools may have supplemental fees and that can be, I mean those range from like $10 to over $100.

If you get a fee waiver from Caspa, that initial $179 will be waived.

But this should be the reason that you're making sure you meet the requirements of programs and that you aren't just willy nilly applying everywhere because that's going to be a waste of your money when it comes to testing.

That would be probably the next biggest expense.

So There is the PA Cat, which is the newer test and it is $228.

Most schools are requiring one or the other if they do require standardized testing at all.

The gre, let's see it as of right now, I just had it pulled up.

Let's see, is $205 to register and then you do want to account for test prep.

And then for the GRE there is a lot of free, free preparation out there.

I got my books to study at the library and I always see books at Goodwill.

So check your kind of thrift stores for options for helping you with study materials there to save on some cost.

Alright, so that's kind of those fees, transcripts that's gonna vary between school.

It could be as low as $10, you know, up to 20, 25, 50.

So that will depend on your school, school and how much they charge, but that is another cost.

Then we have to think about interviews and traveling and getting a suit.

So you need to dress professional, which you may or may not have.

This can be something you wear, you buy new or second hand.

And really.

But with poshmark, ebay, thrift stores, there are great options for getting, you know, suit stuff at a much discounted rate.

Target actually has suits too, so that's something to look into.

And then with interviews, you do want to account for travel, which could include hotel or flying or gas or a rental car.

The past couple years, virtual interviews have become more frequent and that is a huge cost savings saver.

So that's something, you know, if you have the option for a virtual interview, you may want to take that to save on cost.

I know some people will open up a travel credit card to which if you're going to use a credit card, please use it responsibly and pay it off.

But to get points and use those to help with their travel.

Look, ask the schools if they have a discount on hotels.

If they don't offer that, a lot of schools have, have kind of arrangements with hotels, have discounted rates, which can help and also account for the time you're going to have to take off of work.

If you don't have PTO or you are paid hourly, you may have to adjust your budget to account for those things.

So that's a big part of it.

And that may even go into where you're applying.

If you know that you are going to be limited for traveling.

You don't want to apply to all programs across the country because that can be a lot of travel versus applying to places that are more local that you can get to easily.

The other thing when it comes to costs that I would think about are your deposits because if you do get an acceptance, you're going to be expected to put down a deposit that could be a few hundred or a few thousand dollars.

And so that's something that you want to be ready for because you don't want to turn down a school because you're not ready with that deposit.

And so that's something just to keep in mind for when you're applying.

And again, I think we need to go into a lot more detail about this and saving money and planning for this.

But hopefully that gives you a little bit of an overview and you can kind of of start maybe making a spreadsheet, making a list and getting things together now.

All right.

Well, I hope you enjoyed this episode.

I hope that was helpful and if you want to leave a voicemail for the podcast, I would love to answer it in a future episode.

Thank you for listening.

If you do not already subscribe, please hit that subscribe button and give us a five star review to help other Prepa students find the podcast.

And I will see you guys next week.