u/Zone_of_Inhibition

Here’s some background on my situation: older student, just split from my fiancé and now cannot get approved for loans by myself, I’ve already been denied by 4 lenders, I have NO one to co-sign, I owe in undergrad loans and a car loan, cannot do military service due to health reasons, and I am not eligible for GRAD plus loans. I do however receive a lifetime pension (monthly) from my old job, but that doesn’t seem to help me at all when trying to secure private loans….

Program starts in July

Anyway, I heard back from the College of Medicine, Student Finance and Scholarship department today. The university cannot offer me any institutional loans or scholarships because the department doesn’t have the money. They are a very large and notable public university with a great reputation, so I was shocked by this reply. They sent me links to 3rd party scholarships to apply for of varying amounts and due dates. I’m going to sit down and try to sort through as many as possible.

As it stands right now, MINUS the Federal Direct Loans (totaling $61,500 for 3 academic years), I would still owe another $70,000. I have no clue what I’m going to do. I officially asked if deferring until next year would be a possibility. I’m afraid they will say no. If anyone has any off the wall ideas, I’d love to hear them. I would absolutely apply for the NHSC if the app wasn’t already closed. Part of me would love to go ahead and start school as the summer semester would be fully paid for and would give me until August. But I would hate to commit to more debt only to find out that I still can’t fund the rest of my education, and would then have to drop out. 

This whole thing sucks so bad. What happens if somebody was able to secure private loans one year, but then didn’t get approved for the following year? What would the college do then?

Happy CASPA day to all!

Let’s talk about school choice and where to start! I see a lot of people on here post about the “rank” of the program they were accepted to, and how they were accepted to a “top 10” or “top 5” school. I’m not sure if they believe that the rank really matters, or if it’s more for bragging rights of some sort? We need to remember that PA school is not the same as Med school, and the “rank” of your school doesn’t mean anything at all. Below, I will explain what I think you should and should not be paying attention to as you navigate through your application cycle and CASPA journey! First and foremost: Everyone needs to take the information posted on the U.S News & World Report website with a grain of salt….

❗️How U.S. News & World Report conduct their rankings:

So, you want to make a list of PA schools to apply to, but you don’t know where to start? You decide to head over to Google and type in “Best PA programs in the US,” and USNWR’s website is one of the first things to pop up. Each year they update their “rankings,” but no one seems to really pay attention to HOW they form their list. What are their criteria and methodology? Here are statements presented directly on their website regarding their methodology:

• “A school’s rank should be one consideration - not the lone determinant. The rankings reflect peer assessment of academic quality…”

• Rankings are, “Computed solely from the results of peer assessment surveys completed by deans, other administrators are faculty at accredited degree programs or schools.”

• For all health programs: “Respondents rated the academic quality of programs on a scale of 1 to 5. Those unfamiliar with the particular schools program were asked to select “don’t know.” Responses of “don’t know” counted neither for nor against a school.

• They were instructed to select “don’t know” if they “did not have enough knowledge about a program to rate it.

• Response rates for the 206 PA programs listed on their website: 28.9%

• Programs must be “Fully accredited and in good standing” in order to be ranked.

❗️What all of this means and why it matters to you:

• Rankings are computed solely from peer assessment surveys, and therefore, do not measure educational performance or quality of a program

• Respondents rate academic quality on a scale of 1 to 5, and they remove the two highest and two lowest scores per program. This only removes outliers, but does not remove the bias

• Higher score = stronger reputation

• There are no objective performance metrics included in any of the evaluations

• What’s NOT included in their evaluations: PANCE pass rates, attrition, employment outcomes, clinical placement and quality, or the accreditation stability of a program

• Nonresponse bias is present, and the respondents are not representative of the full population

• Respondents are allowed to select “don’t know” as an option, and these responses are excluded. This means that respondents don’t even know about most of the programs out there. There’s currently more than 300 programs in the U.S.

• Well-known programs will be acknowledged, and lesser known programs will be ignored entirely

“Only fully accredited programs in good standing during the survey period are ranked.” Accreditation quality is a spectrum that encompasses multiple things such as probation history, attrition warnings, PANCE rates and alerts, and repeated deficiencies in a program’s history. Yet U.S News excludes any of these things from their rankings. So a program with repeated accreditation issues and warnings could be on the same level playing field as programs with zero deficiencies, so long as the program isn’t currently sanctioned. U.S. News rankings are entirely driven by peer opinion and reputation rather than metrics. This incentivizes programs to invest in their visibility and branding to promote some sort of prestige rather than improving students’ needs. This ENTIRE ranking system is based off of how favorably other academic institutions perceive you. In other words, it’s a popularity contest.

Literally 4 of the schools I interviewed with mentioned their “rank” during the informational session just to make themselves sound better. One of them even has their rank plastered on a banner right when you walk inside the building, stating, “Ranked one of the best PA programs in the country by U.S News.” These rankings drive applicant turnout, which in turn drives programs to improve their notoriety and reputation via things like conferences, ranking events, or those stupid emails we get in our spam folders (I’m looking at YOU High Point).

✅What you SHOULD be evaluating, and how to rank your schools:

For me, location of the school was one of the most important things I looked at, and it’s how I started compiling my list of programs. Because if I hated the area that I was in for 2 years, then I knew I was going to be miserable no matter what. After you decide on your general area(s), these are the next most important aspects to research for each program:

• First-time PANCE pass rates

• Ultimate PANCE pass rates

• Attrition rate (percent of the total amount of students that don’t make it though the program - could be because they failed out, were kicked out, recycled into the next class, or decided to withdraw on their own accord)

• Graduation rate

• Each program’s most recent comprehensive review of their accreditation (found on ARC PA website)

The last one is very important and often goes unnoticed by a lot of applicants. When you look up each school, it’s important to apply to schools that are not currently on probation, as that’s a giant red flag 🚩. But it’s ALSO important to see if a program has recently been on probation or received any warnings, and what for. If a program has had repeated issues and warnings, and they are for things other than little administrative issues, then it may be better to stay away from these schools. One of the schools I applied to was in the top 25 list on the U.S. News website. However, after diving deeper into their accreditation history and attrition rates, the school ended up being ranked #24 out of 25 on my personal list. They have been on probation in the last several years and also had several warnings for major things in their program.

It important that you do thorough research on each school you’re applying to. For 1, because you don’t want to apply to a program that’s going to fail you (putting you thousands of dollars in debt), and for 2, you don’t want to waste your money even applying to these schools in the first place.

🩺 I hope the above information was somewhat helpful! I could go on and on about this for hours to be honest. I recently gave a presentation on this at my Alma mater, as I’m really passionate about helping applicants out! If you need help with compiling a school list, or have questions about a program, please post on here so others can help you! Good luck!✨