Skip to main content

About Me

Hello!

Thanks for reading my blog. My name is Olivia, and I am a non-traditional, distance PA student in Wisconsin. As a distance student, I am completing my didactic education over two years instead of one, and then will have one year of clinicals. I watch my lectures online and have my exams proctored at a local public library. Because I am a "part-time" PA student right now (but, technically a full-time grad student!), I am able to keep working. I work 24-32 hours a week as a clinical dietitian at a local hospital. Needless to say, I am quite busy! In fact, you can read about my daily routine here.



I've written a few posts about my pre-PA story, so check those out to learn about what I did to get into PA school, how I chose what schools to apply to, and mistakes I made along the way.

What else can I say about myself? I'm in my 30s, I own a home and have an adorable dog named Milo who is the best study buddy. I'm an extrovert and I love squeezing in time in my busy schedule to meet friends for tacos, go for a hike, grab a drink, or walk to the farmers market. When I'm taking breaks from studying, you can probably find me taking Milo for a long walk while listening to a true crime podcast!



I originally had a career in the marketing and advertising industry as a copywriter and social media specialist, but then went back to school to get my certificate in dietetics. Originally, I thought I would be a private practice dietitian and have a strong online presence (given my background in social media), but I fell in love with clinical nutrition and working in a hospital. And while I still enjoy being a dietitian, I can't wait for this next challenge and career!


You'll see that one of my focuses on this blog is related to budget. While I am certainly no expert on the matter, it's important for me to be as financially savvy as possible and to try and keep my student loan debt as small as possible (a laughable task given that I've put myself through college three times!). According to ThePALife.com, "the average anticipated debt load from PA school is at $112,500." A staggering number. I can't imagine I'm the only PA student stressing over how to pay for this adventure, so I hope you can learn something along with me!

Oh, and I should mention you can follow me on Instagram, too!

Thanks so much for reading,
Olivia


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

PA School Interviews: 35 Practice Questions and Tips for Zoom

Getting ready for PA school interviews? Congratulations! And while interview season may look a little different this year (Zoom calls, anyone?), the importance of being properly prepared is still the same! I used to work in advertising and public relations, and sometimes I would prepare experts to talk to the media. What was the most important thing for the experts to do? Know your key messages. There's going to be topics you know will likely be addressed in an interview, so be prepared to speak to those specific things.  Same goes for PA school interviews. Yes, I've heard of programs asking some off-the-wall questions that you probably wouldn't see coming, but generally speaking there's a variety of likely topics that will come up. My advice? Think through how you want to answer those questions ahead of time. For me, this looked like an 11-page Google doc with sample questions I prepared answers for. It forced me to think through scenarios I'd want to share and my ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Resiliency: PA School During a Pandemic

I saw this article on Facebook and it really hit home for me: "Your 'Surge Capacity' is Depleted -- It's Why You Feel Awful." I strongly encourage you to read the whole article yourself, but a few things stuck out to me that I feel compelled to share.  First, what's surge capacity? It's your adaptive abilities for dealing with acute stress. The problem with a pandemic is that it isn't really acute in the same way that a massive tornado or other disaster might be. We're in this for the long haul, and if you're like me, those adaptive abilities have worn thin.  For me, this has looked like feelings of helplessness and exhaustion. I've spent a lot more time on my couch watching bad reality TV than I'd like to admit. But with school starting in up in less than a week, that really isn't going to fly. So how does a student (in an intensive graduate program) keep moving forward? "Both-And" Thinking One of my favorite lessons fro...
Post a Comment
Read more

Three tips for a successful interview

With interview season upon us, I thought I would share my best tips for confidently answering those hard-hitting questions.  Tip #1: Create a messaging document.  A what-now? A messaging document. I used to work in communications and public relations, so preparing people for interviews with news outlets was actually a part of my job. Essentially, you come up with a set of questions you expect the interviewer may ask you, and write up how you'd like to respond.  You can find questions galore online (from The PA Life , The PA Platform , and AASPA , just to name a few). Choose a nice variety, and start writing out your answers -- even to the ones that seem easy! For example, "tell me about yourself" might seem really straightforward, but you want to say a few key things about yourself without yammering on forever.  I took this really seriously. I chose 48 questions and wrote out answers for each one; my messaging document ended up being over 11 pages lo...
Post a Comment
Read more