CASPA Survival Guide

Hi pals, with CASPA opening up within the next month, I thought some of you might find this blogspot helpful! I had trouble navigating through the application process so I can relate to your stress! I remember meticuously tweaking my personal statement every day and impatiently wondering if I would ever get an interview invite. Looking back, I can definitely say all the stress and time was worth it!

To learn about what you can do early before CASPA opens, check out my other post here! I also recommend checking out CASPA's FAQ which I've linked on my main blog page!

CASPA opens on April 27th this year! The first thing to do would be to create a profile with your email. When I first tried to open CASPA on Safari, it didn't work for me so if you run into this problem I recommend trying Google Chrome! As you guys probably already know, I'm a big supporter of submitting your app as early as possible since most schools operate on roling admissions! This gives you a better chance of recieving an itnerview earlier on when more seats are available in the program.

The first thing I did when started the application was add all the schools I planned on applying to. Keep in mind that not all schools are on CASPA and may have their own specific application which should be posted on the school's website. Also, certain schools become available at different times. For example, most of my schools were available on the day CASPA opens, some applications became available June 1st or July 1st. Adding your schools also does not have to be the first step; you can do this later on!

Personal Information

• This is where you fill out your name, address, DOB, contact information, citizenship, and family information!
• This section is pretty easy to fill out and doesn't take long at all

Academic History

• The first categroy under this section is "High Schools Attended". Here you list the high school(s) you atended, but you don't need to send in a high school transcript!
• Colleges Attended- here you list the colleges you attended. You do need to submit an official transcript from this all of your colleges. First, download the Transcript Request Form and complete it. Then, you can send your official transcript through the mail to CASPA's mailing address. You must address the official transcript to CASPA. If the transcript to addressed to you or a specific program, it won't be accepted. It usually takes 7-10 buisness days for CASPA tp recieve your transcript. 
• Transcript Entry- Here you have to manually input all of your college courses. For those of you like me who will not have completed your bachelors degree before submitting your application, you can list some of your classes as in progress if you haven't completed them yet or are planning to take them. Later, you can go in and change your these classes and fill in your grades. This task can be tedious so make sure you leave yourself time to complete it! I would have a copy of an official or unofficial transcrip on hand to make sure all your classes and grades match up. If they don't your app will be returned and your process delayed. 
• Lastly in this section is the standardized test scores category. Here is where you list the GRE if you've taken it or the MCAT or TOEFL if taken! You list your score recieved on the GRE and then through the GRE website/ets, you can send your GRE score to each school through their school specific code! I believe that when you take the GRE, you're allowed to send your score to up to 4 programs for free. After that, you have to pay a fee for every additional program. I would follow up with each program to see if they have recieved your score. 

Supporting Information

• Evaluations- Here is where you submit your Letters of Rec! When adding a recommender, you fill out some information about them and include their email. A link to fill out and upload the LOR will be sent to their email! You only need to have 2 LOR to submit your CASPA app! Even so, I still recommend reaching out to your recommenders before CASPA opens and telling them when you plan to submit your application. Teachers will most likely be writing LORs for multiple students so you want to make sure you're one of the first students in their queue to get your letter or rec in a timely fashion.  You can add a maximum amount of 5 recommendations and a minimum of 3. 
• Experiences-Here is where you add all of your healthcare experiences! Volunteering, shadowing, health care experience, patient care experiences, and employement all go here. When filling out your experiences, you have to first select which type of experience this is and then the name and address of the organization. You also have to submit informaiton about your supervisor as well as their contact information. You also list your title, type of recognition (compensated, academic credit, or volunteer), as well as your average weekly hours and the number of weeks you completed this experience over. The most important part of this section is listing your description/key responsibilites. I think it's not only important to list your role, but also how this experience impacted you. I suggest working on this ahead of time by making spreadsheets which you can read about in the post I linked above!
  
• Achievements- Here is where you can list any type of honors you recieved such as dean's list, scholarships given to you by your school, and honor societies. Some examples are: Order of Omega and Trib Beta Honor Society
• Certifications- List any type of certifications you have here such as CNA, EMT, or BLS provider/CPR certified! If you don't have any certifications, I definitely recommend that you become BLS  CPR certified! It's not time consuming or expensive and it looks good on your resume! It's also important to efresh yourself on these important skills!
• Essay- Personal statement!! You can have a maximum of 5000 characters here. I had to trim mine down so practice writing consisely when writing your drafts.
• Release Statement- This statement makes sure that you are farmiliar with the Personal Code of Contact and that your information can be released to your academic advisor. 
• Documents-  Here is where you can list course descriptions. For example, since Drexel is on the quater system, my microbiolgoy class was a maximum of 5 quarter credits, which did not translate to 4 semester hours, but my course description mentioned how the class met for 7 hours a week. Because of this course description, my credits for this class were accepted.
• Membership-List any memberships you are part of. I definitely recommend joining the AAPA as an affilate member to learn more about the PA profession, as well as joining your state PA society!

Program Materials

• After adding all your schoos, they will appear in this section. Each school has a different supplemental to fill out. Some of them are just a few and a few multiple choice questions, others are short essays. In addition to this, for some schools you will have to add your prerequisites through your manual transcript entry. It's also important for you to keep track ov every school's deadline since they will all vary. Some of mine were as early as August first or as late as December 15th. Some programs require that your application be completed by a certain date, while others require your application to be verified by a specific date. Completion means that your application does not have to ber verified by the deadline given. Keep in mind, verification can take up to 4 weeks depending on when you apply. 

If you have any specific questions, you can always call CASPA and ask them directly! They're super helpful, but also get tons of calls so make sure you can right around 9 PM if you don't want to be kept waiting on the phone! Don't overwhelm yourself, you've got this. Just take it day by day and remind yourself that it's all part of the journey to become a PA! 

I would love to do a FAQ so if anyone has specific questions they would like answered, please email me at fanaticpa@gmail.com or DM me on instagram @pafanatic!