Advice please for Best Degree for CAA Route

[Stonybeach]

Attending live classes for the medical prerequisites should increase your chances of acceptance. I have noticed a few post-bachelor online programs for premedical coursework, but I do not know anyone who has done them.

"UNE Online’s Post-Baccalaureate Pre-Health Certificate is a 18-30 credit program and is designed for students who want to pursue an advanced degree in healthcare or medicine but have yet to complete the required health science courses required for admission into health or medical school."

https://online.une.edu/post-baccalaureate-pre-health/

[LopsiddedMind84]

Attending live classes for the medical prerequisites should increase your chances of acceptance. I have noticed a few post-bachelor online programs for premedical coursework, but I do not know anyone who has done them.

"UNE Online’s Post-Baccalaureate Pre-Health Certificate is a 18-30 credit program and is designed for students who want to pursue an advanced degree in healthcare or medicine but have yet to complete the required health science courses required for admission into health or medical school."

https://online.une.edu/post-baccalaureate-pre-health/

I was actually just looking at this! thank you so much!!

[Hotdogman1]

Check whether taking those prereqs online is allowed too. Online courses were accepted during Covid but schools are returning to requiring only in-person courses again (for prereqs). I’ve never seen that UNE certificate before, but I know people that did UNE’s self-paced courses and others like portage learning.
https://online.une.edu/science-prerequisites/
https://portagelearning.edu/
Although there is precedence of schools accepting these courses before Covid, they always felt risky to me. If possible, do the classes in person. Makes life so much easier.

The rest of the bachelor's doesn't matter as much, but I was told it was recommended the last 60 credits should be done at a RA institution (I don’t know for sure so take with a grain of salt). The major doesn't matter as long as you complete the prereqs (again, In-person recommended). I'd recommend doing them at a local community college and just complete one of those Chemistry/Biology/premed Associates of Science if it has all the prereqs.

So theoretically, if you were looking to go to UMPI:
Sophia (1-2 months)
You can mostly follow any of the degree plans. However:
Do not take English 1 or 2, No Math courses, None of the science or anatomy courses except for maybe Environmental Science, Introduction to Nutrition, and Health, Fitness, and Wellness.

Coursera (do with Sophia): take whatever course the degree plan calls for.

Local CC (1 semester/4 months): Take at least Calculus and General Chem with a Physical Lab (2 years Chem>1 year Bio. Also for UMPI Science and Math GEC) If you didn’t take chem/Math during high school, you might have to test in or do a prerequisite course. If that’s the case, take two CLEP exams via ModernStates: Precalculus and Chemistry. DO NOT TAKE AT SOPHIA.

UMPI (2-6 Months): Complete 30 RA+ credits and graduate.

Local CC (4-5 semesters): Complete the rest of your prereqs/complete the associates. Do Anatomy with lab.

So results: Bachelor's + all Prereqs complete = ~90 Alt Credits + ~90 RA Credits (60 in-person). You don't have to transfer in the maximum amount of transfer credit into UMPI since that would mean more RA credits, but it wouldn't really matter either way. What were you planning to do with the old Penn State credits? What exact courses were they?

[LopsiddedMind84]

Check whether taking those prereqs online is allowed too. Online courses were accepted during Covid but schools are returning to requiring only in-person courses again (for prereqs). I’ve never seen that UNE certificate before, but I know people that did UNE’s self-paced courses and others like portage learning.
https://online.une.edu/science-prerequisites/
https://portagelearning.edu/
Although there is precedence of schools accepting these courses before Covid, they always felt risky to me. If possible, do the classes in person. Makes life so much easier.

The rest of the bachelor's doesn't matter as much, but I was told it was recommended the last 60 credits should be done at a RA institution (I don’t know for sure so take with a grain of salt). The major doesn't matter as long as you complete the prereqs (again, In-person recommended). I'd recommend doing them at a local community college and just complete one of those Chemistry/Biology/premed Associates of Science if it has all the prereqs.

So theoretically, if you were looking to go to UMPI:
Sophia (1-2 months)
You can mostly follow any of the degree plans. However:
Do not take English 1 or 2, No Math courses, None of the science or anatomy courses except for maybe Environmental Science, Introduction to Nutrition, and Health, Fitness, and Wellness.

Coursera (do with Sophia): take whatever course the degree plan calls for.

Local CC (1 semester/4 months): Take at least Calculus and General Chem with a Physical Lab (2 years Chem>1 year Bio. Also for UMPI Science and Math GEC) If you didn’t take chem/Math during high school, you might have to test in or do a prerequisite course. If that’s the case, take two CLEP exams via ModernStates: Precalculus and Chemistry. DO NOT TAKE AT SOPHIA.

UMPI (2-6 Months): Complete 30 RA+ credits and graduate.

Local CC (4-5 semesters): Complete the rest of your prereqs/complete the associates. Do Anatomy with lab.

So results: Bachelor's + all Prereqs complete = ~90 Alt Credits + ~90 RA Credits (60 in-person). You don't have to transfer in the maximum amount of transfer credit into UMPI since that would mean more RA credits, but it wouldn't really matter either way. What were you planning to do with the old Penn State credits? What exact courses were they?

it was just business and chem and bio labs  first year seminar i failed pretty much everything because i didn't even show up i rather worked and it was very dumb and immature and something i regret to this day.  thank you so much for laying this out for me 

[Stonybeach]

I realize you are focused on a certain pathway, but I wanted to mention the importance of the recency of clinical experience. As a former Anesthesia technician, you have clinical experience, but it was long ago. Interviewers like to see some recency in the clinical setting. You may be able to leverage your previous OR experience and pursue a CSFA. https://www.meridian-institute.edu/
This gets you back in the OR, allowing you to be employed full or part-time as an SA and gain valuable experience during the intraoperative period. You can still pursue other education while scrubbing in as a first or second assistant in surgery. This program has an online didactic followed by a week of on-campus animal lab and clinical training in your hometown. The program is CAAHEP and ABHES accredited, leading to certification as a CSFA and licensure in states that license surgical assistants. https://www.caahep.org/

It is just a thought, although I am biased toward becoming an RN, RNFA, and perhaps a CRNA or NP with first-assistant privileges. I realize "nursing" is not for everyone, but the training is excellent, especially in a hospital-affiliated university. With that said, not all nursing schools are equal! Overall, I don't have a problem with distance learning, but there has been an unprecedented number of for-profit nursing schools that have emerged in the last 15 years, pumping out low-quality practitioners. One used to have to be an RN for at least two years before applying to NP school, but many schools have dropped this requirement.

[Duneranger]

Attending live classes for the medical prerequisites should increase your chances of acceptance. I have noticed a few post-bachelor online programs for premedical coursework, but I do not know anyone who has done them.

"UNE Online’s Post-Baccalaureate Pre-Health Certificate is a 18-30 credit program and is designed for students who want to pursue an advanced degree in healthcare or medicine but have yet to complete the required health science courses required for admission into health or medical school."

https://online.une.edu/post-baccalaureate-pre-health/

These can work, UNE is widely accepted but remember you are COMPETING, not just checking a box.

[Hotdogman1]

I realize you are focused on a certain pathway, but I wanted to mention the importance of the recency of clinical experience. As a former Anesthesia technician, you have clinical experience, but it was long ago. Interviewers like to see some recency in the clinical setting. You may be able to leverage your previous OR experience and pursue a CSFA. https://www.meridian-institute.edu/
This gets you back in the OR, allowing you to be employed full or part-time as an SA and gain valuable experience during the intraoperative period. You can still pursue other education while scrubbing in as a first or second assistant in surgery. This program has an online didactic followed by a week of on-campus animal lab and clinical training in your hometown.  The program is CAAHEP and ABHES accredited, leading to certification as a CSFA and licensure in states that license surgical assistants. https://www.caahep.org/

It is just a thought, although I am biased toward becoming an RN, RNFA, and perhaps a CRNA or NP with first-assistant privileges. I realize "nursing" is not for everyone, but the training is excellent, especially in a hospital-affiliated university.

I never even considered CSFA to improve my application since most programs just require a couple hours of shadowing. I don't know if it would improve an application, but that kinda sounds genius and a great way to stand out. 

it was just business and chem and bio labs  first year seminar i failed pretty much everything because i didn't even show up i rather worked and it was very dumb and immature and something i regret to this day.  thank you so much for laying this out for me 

You can't just "start fresh." You need to submit all transcripts when you apply. Universities, especially competitive medical related grad schools, can use services like the National Clearinghouse for verification so it can be found. You can try not submitting the Penn State transcript and hope they don't find it, but why risk it?

Assuming you get an "A" on the 93 RA Credits (+3 since you now want to take First year seminar in person now and hopefully you can do that Business course at UMPI...), that would make that: 77 credits "A", 16 credits "C-". Overall, you would have a 3.60 GPA (Probably wrong since I just put that directly into a generic GPA calculator. Find a CASAA calculator somewhere and use that for a better answer.) It's not the 4.0 you were hoping for but it's higher than Emory's 23-24 matriculant  3.59 gpa average (https://med.emory.edu/departments/anesth...stats.html) and most other CAA schools. You could also increase your GPA by doing more RA courses, but the GPA increase would be incremental. As long as you get a good GRE/MCAT score, you should be very competitive. You should even add portions of that "i failed pretty much everything because i didn't even show up i rather worked and it was very dumb and immature and something i regret to this day." into your personal statement and it would be an "inspirational" story you could tell during the interview.

If you do more research on this, you will inevitably see "start fresh" or "Academic Renewal" policies. Penn state does seems to have an Academic Renewal policy:
"If a grade forgiveness request is approved, the original course still will appear on the student's official transcript, but will not earn credit or count towards the student's term or cumulative GPA." https://www.registrar.psu.edu/grades/gra...veness.cfm

Don't get your hopes up. It doesn't matter because CASAA factors in the failed course anyways.
"CASAA does not recognize an individual school's policies for forgiveness, academic renewal, or grade replacement for repeated courses. CASAA will verify based on how grades for repeated courses are reported on the official transcripts. All grades earned for repeated courses are factored into your CASAA GPA." (https://help.liaisonedu.com/CASAA_Applic...lculations)

[Stonybeach]

Interestingly, my wife recently had cataract surgery, and the Ophthalmologist hired Optometrists as general healthcare providers (the eye) and uses them as first assistants in surgery. In this setting, the Optometrist is basically a "physician extender" to the Ophthalmologist, performing history and physicals (H&P), referring the patient for surgical procedures, prescribing corrective lenses, treating infections, glaucoma, and other eye health issues, and first assisting in surgery and providing post-operative care. I've never seen an optometrist utilized like that before. With a couple of optometrists in his practice, he can make a smooth million a year focusing on surgeries while they take care of everything else. He still was booked weeks out in advance. That is genius!

[Hotdogman1]

Interestingly, my wife recently had cataract surgery, and the Ophthalmologist hired Optometrists as general healthcare providers (the eye) and uses them as first assistants in surgery. In this setting, the Optometrist is basically a "physician extender" to the Ophthalmologist, performing history and physicals (H&P), referring the patient for surgical procedures, prescribing corrective lenses, treating infections, glaucoma, and other eye health issues, and first assisting in surgery and providing post-operative care. I've never seen an optometrist utilized like that before. That is genius!

I remember you replying to me about the concept on another thread. I think it was after I mentioned previously looking into becoming a PA specializing in Ophthalmology as an alternative to Optometry school. Optometrist typically aren't trained to do surgery so I didn't know how that was possible, but a optometrist with a CSFA makes total sense. That is awesome.

[Stonybeach]

Don't forget, a first assistant can bill insurance for his or her role in the surgical procedure which is about 13 percent of the surgeon's rate. I would talk with an Ophthalmologist and get his take. Of course, he may simply pay a salary or salary with an override for extra work. There are many ways to negotiate pay. The MD makes the most in the OR and wants competent providers doing everything else even though he is trained to do it.

As far as an Optometrist needing the CSFA credential, that is unnecessary! The MD will hire and train them for their duties in the OR. However, since you brought it up, an Optometrist with a CSFA may be useful for first assisting in other areas, such as facial plastic surgery??

As far as audiology, I think it is an awesome career with excellent training. It will be interesting to see if all the "over-the-counter" advanced hearing aids coming out will impact the earnings of audiologists. I realize they specialize in other areas such as speech pathology, cochlear implants, tinnitus, military disability evaluations, profound hearing loss, etc.