Top 5 Things Pre-Physical Therapy Students Should Focus on During Their Senior Year 

In this post, you’ll find my advice for what Pre-PTs should focus on during their senior year of college. Keep in mind that not all Pre-PTs follow the “traditional” route to PT school, this list is only meant to be a guide relating to the years before applying to PT school. Shift this list to your journey as you need.

1. Focus on submitting applications in a timely manner

I had a specific goal during application season to make sure I submitted before my senior year started. Typically, applications are due in early to mid-October, November, or December. Because of this, it would be easy for applying to bleed into the first semester of classes. I didn’t want that for myself, so I made sure to submit mine in mid-August. However, when you decide to submit isn’t always important as long as you have all of your requirements done in a timely manner. This means giving the people writing your letters of recommendation a cutoff date far before your submission deadline, having all essays written and revised ahead of time, and having all PTCAS information inputted correctly. 

PTCAS will bounce back your application if any discrepancies are found after verification. For example, if you submit your application the day before the deadline, but mess up your transcript entry, your application might not be accepted. 

2. Finish your remaining PT school prerequisites  

This is incredibly important as you must complete them for your application to be complete. Be sure to get these all finished as you don’t want unfinished prerequisites affecting your conditional acceptance. 
Conditional acceptance is what DPT programs offer when they initially accept you. Things like poor grades, violating their moral clauses, or failing to complete your prerequisites are grounds for retracting your acceptance.

Double and triple-check with the schools that you have, or will, complete your remaining prereqs in time.

3. Try not to fixate on your application after you hit submit 

As tempting as it might be to obsess over your application after you’ve submitted it, try not to. While there are some things you can edit like experiences, you cannot edit important things like essays and transcripts. (Not unless it’s dire and not without contacting the PT school). Make sure you go over your application and have other people look at it too if you can. Do this so that when you submit you can be confident that everything is as you want it. Once you hit submit and make sure you’ve received your confirmation, leave it alone. The rest is a waiting game, but you most likely won’t hear from any schools until after a month, or even longer. Take this time to relax and enjoy that all of your hard work has brought you to this point.

4. Don’t ignore your classes. They still count, even after being accepted.

We talked about conditional acceptance in number 2, but this also applies to your future classes too. You can’t submit your application and then fail 4 classes in a row the next semester. This is an exaggeration of course, but it is still something to keep in mind. Your graduation GPA must still meet the requirements of the PT school. This is the home stretch, finish out strong. 

5. Enjoy your time before PT school starts and make the most of your final year of undergrad.

Now, this is very optional, but I chose to stop all things related to PT after I received my acceptance. I didn’t want to get “PT burned out”. My goal was to finish my senior year and summer out strong and be ready to jump back into all things physical therapy in the fall. I decided to stop seeking out observation hours and focus on having fun and finishing my senior year. I would encourage you to spend this time doing what you want and not just preparing for PT school.

For more insight into how I spent my senior year of college, check out my blog post: A Pre-Physical Therapy Student’s Timeline of Undergrad.

Please leave a comment! Let me know your thoughts about this list and good luck to everyone applying!