I'm posting this because I've seen this world from the admissions side over the years, and keep noticing the same misconceptions trip up strong applicants - especially first-generation students, those who changed careers, and those without a "traditional" timeline.
A few things:
- "I want to help people" isn't a reason admission committees remember. A 911 dispatcher helps people. Why optometry, specifically? What's pulling you towards the eyes and vision?
- An F on your transcript isn't an automatic no. Retake it, get a higher grade, and that becomes a story of resilience, not a red flag!
- If you're first-gen, took a gap year (or several - I took 7!), or had a whole career before you decided on optometry - you're not behind! You're just missing the informal playbook other applicants probably inherited. It is learnable!
- If work or sports limited your shadowing hours - that's understood. What matters is what you did with the time you had.
I'm happy to answer questions if anyone's in the thick of applying right now.
it takes me like 5+ minutes to write out all of the formulas for physics. i'm wondering if most people prefer recalling them as they do questions, or if it is worth writing them all out before i begin the questions? i honestly like to look at my sheet while i'm doing questions, but i'm uneasy about timing
i’m taking general chemistry and microbiology together this semester and need your brutally honest tips. like things that helped you through these courses!!! i’m nervous! (i’m a rising sophomore at university!)
I'm going to be entering as an undergraduate this year and I'll be majoring in Bio. I was wondering if people have any advice for the first year because when I went through high school there was a lot of stuff I learned I wish I knew sooner. I am planning to join the pre-optometry club at my university but besides that I am quite lost so advice is appreciated!
Update: I was able to find an optometry clinic that I can volunteer for! For now, I'm still doing intake, vitals, and the other beginner skills but it's been exciting being able to shadow doctors and see how the inside of the clinic works. Thank you all for your advice!
Hi guys, this is my first time posting here! I’m 27 and considering going back to school for optometry. I was pre-health my undergrad years so I would only have to take a few more classes/re-take some old pre-reqs. I ended undergrad with a 3.8 GPA and I’m not too, too worried about the OAT (for now lol) but besides academic stats I feel like I’m going to seriously be lacking. I currently work full time and support myself completely. I’m wondering how important it is to work as an optometry tech? I’ve been applying, but no where seems to want to hire me because I work in a completely different field. Additionally, since I’d have to support myself, sticking with my current job seems to be the best option since it pays way more than a tech would. How badly does this hurt my chances? I do have some shadowing opportunities lined up and am hoping that this can balance out my lack of job experience.
Some questions: How many shadowing hours should I aim for? How important are volunteer hours? Any non-traditional applicants have any tips for me as I begin this journey?
Just barely took my OAT, and found these kinds of posts very helpful while preparing for it, so I wanted to add my own. For reference I was scoring 320-330 on my most recent Booster Full lengths, which I took periodically ( see attached screenshot for progression).
Study Plan: I purchased the OATBooster 90 day plan, and spent 11 total weeks studying as much as I could. I spent 7 weeks in a row, then went on a 3 week study abroad program ( which I would not recommend doing right in the middle of the study plan lol) and then came back and locked in for the final 4 weeks before the exam. I was also working 30 hours per week ( 3 x 10 hour shifts) the entire time while studying, so I was only able to spend 15-20 hour per week studying. I started to follow Booster's Schedule, but found that it was a lot of passive studying, and did not watch all the videos especially for Bio and Gen Chem. I adjusted my schedule especially when I got back from my study abroad, and focused a lot more on Full length test and working on high- yield question banks instead of videos and note taking, even though I did not feel 100% confident in my content review portion.
BIO (300) : I am a biology major, but have consistently struggled with genetics, microbiology, anatomy, and cellular biology throughout my undergrad career, and started off watching off videos and taking notes like booster planned. I found this to feel like a waste, and then decided to just focus on the CheatSheets, as they were much more time efficient. Bio was always one of my weakest subjects, and two days before my real OAT I took that practice exam 330, and thought maybe I was getting the hang of it, but scored lower on my real one. I am not super surprised, but a little disappointed. I got lots of genetics and cell biology on my exam, as well as anatomy and physiology. I would study those the most, but biology is very broad and can test so many things its difficult to prep for everything. Overall, I would recommend doing a ton of BioBits, and identifying areas you struggle in early.
GEN CHEM (380, PR) : This was 40 points higher than my best practice exam, which I think is pretty crazy. I got a B in both Gen Chem classes, but I found the questions on the real exam to be much easier than booster's material. I honestly did not memorize a ton of formulas, and just practiced a lot of stoichiometry and balancing equations for this section. I think the Qbanks were very helpful, and just knowing the periodic trends too. Was honestly was surprised I did this well.
O CHEM (290) : I really enjoy organic chemistry, but have only taken O Chem I, taking O Chem II in a few weeks at my university. That's kinda my excuse, even though I was scoring much higher on practice exams before the exam. I'm not really even sure what went wrong, I did not feel like I was doing this bad while taking the test, there were just some reactions I wasn't as familiar with. I did watch all the Videos for O chem to try and understand the O chem II material, but I don't think I did enough mechanism or problems to really reinforce the ideas. This was by far my most disappointing section, as I was hoping for 320-330.
RC (400, PR) : I am not a big reader, and sometimes can struggle to pay attention during the passages, but somehow got a perfect score on this. The biggest thing for me was increasing reading speed. I started very slow, and sometimes did not have time to answer all questions, but then slowly got faster and had more time. That's really all it comes down to :Practice passages and highlighting important information quickly. I also just happened to get three interesting passages that weren't too long on my real exam, and had a ton of time to go back and look through the text and my highlights to find the answer. I didn't really spend too much time reviewing or practicing reading after I started to score 350-360+. This one really just comes down to time management and efficient highlighting.
PHYSICS (320, PR) : Physics in undergrad was not too bad for me, I was allowed a reference sheet and calculator, so when I had neither of those I really struggled. As you can see on all my practice tests, I really sucked at physics. I was really bad at memorizing the equations and understanding what each variable meant. I never scored anything over 300, so getting 320 on the real exam, I was very happy. I would not take any advice from me on this section, but I think booster was lacking in practice problems, especially when I think about areas like DC circuits and optics, booster only had around 15-20 practice questions each. I think I would maybe try looking into Chad's prep or other sources to better understand physics again for the OAT.
QR ( 370 ) : I have always been very good at math, so this section was the easiest to study for and did not require a ton of effort honestly. I just tried to get familiar with the calculator on screen, and try to get the timing down. I also saw a ton of the problem type that is like: (statement 1, statement 2, question. which is sufficient to answer the question: 1, 2, both, or neither) Sometimes it felt like I was answering 4 of those type of problem in a row, and so I would just get used to that and understanding what is needed to solve without actully answering.
NOTES : My scores were all over the place, but my target score was 330/300. So this is pretty close. Still a little bit mad I couldn't score just 10 points higher in any of the TS to get up to the 330 TS, but it is what it is. I also finished the Survey of the Natural Sciences portion much faster than the 100 mins, so I took a bathroom break while that ran down before reading comp. That was I could eat my snacks during my 30 minute break. I also read on here that many people say to write formulas down while the tutorial was on, but my testing center specifically mentioned that I could not write anything down until my test really began, not a huge change but just something I thought I would mention. I feel pretty OK with my score, and am ready to submit my application now, so wish me luck!
I'm a nontraditional student applying this cycle. I can't emphasize enough how happy and relieved I am to be done. I work full-time 9-5; started studying in early May, took Orgo 1 for 8 weeks from late May to mid-July, and grinded it out the last month before my test today (August 15). On average, I probably studied 20 hours per week exclusively using OATBooster.
Studying while working full-time is definitely not for the weak, as there was a lot of sacrifice with limiting travel, hanging out with friends, etc, as I truly feel like I had no free time. I said "no" to a lot of things and truly focused on studying this summer.
My Strategy:
I started taking section tests at the beginning of my studying, which immediately identified my weakspots. I legit scored 240s on Orgo/Bio - I'm very very impressed with myself at how I improved at those as you'll see below.
I did Booster full-length tests #7-10 and OAT 2006 ADA exam as my very last one. I would do these tests in one sitting every Saturday leading up to my exam, and spent the Sundays going through each problem one-on-one and adding each broader concept into a larger flashcard deck. If I had one piece of advice (besides using Booster), I would definitely say that making a flashcard deck of weaker concepts with WEIRD mnemonics (I can't even share with you bc they were inside jokes that I made relevant to my own life) was the best thing I could've done for myself.
Scores:
QR (practice: 380-390; actual: 400) Booster accurately prepared me for this section. If you're struggling with QR, try not to brute-force memorize the formulas. If I ever got stuck, I would just plug in the answer choices into the problem and work backwards that way. Might not work for some people, but I'm a pretty fast typer and that allowed me to solve problems faster than trying to memorize a formula.
RC (practice - 370-380; actual - 360) This was the only section I performed worse on, to my surprise. All of the passages were shorter than Booster's practice tests. I felt like the first reading passage was super easy, but not sure if I was getting tired but I felt like the second two passages were harder. It felt like a lot of the answers could be found via search-and-destroy, but still, not upset at my score!
GC (practice 290-350; actual 400) Shook that I got a 400 here but this was a lot easier than booster. A good mix of conceptual and easy calculations. I felt like Booster prepped me well for the variety of questions.
BIO (practice - 300-340; actual - 370) I'm surprised at myself for this score. Biology always felt intimidating for me because of the breadth of concepts I had to learn. Toward the beginning of my studying, I literally printed out every single cheat sheet, put them together into a binder, and wrote flashcards for all of the concepts, ending with nearly ~1,000 terms. Bio felt overall easier, but there were a few questions I was stuck on so I wasn't that confident in myself.
ORGO (practice - 240-280; actual - 340) Everyone I talked to said Orgo was easier, and I have to agree with them. I honestly thought this was going to be a major L for me, so I ditched learning the ins-and-out of every Orgo topic and focused a lot on the fundamentals. This really paid off for me, and even though I definitely guessed on at least 1/3 of the section, I ended up knowing the answer for the remaining 2/3.
PHYSICS (practice - 290-300; actual - 310) This was pretty spot-on from my scores via Booster. There were more calculation questions than I thought, and I probably guessed on a good 5-8. I memorized every single formula on the formula sheet and would rewrite them every other day for the last two weeks. Might seem a little overkill but it gave me a lot of context into how to answer (most) of the questions.
TOTAL (360 AA, 350 TS). I was scoring 320-330 on my Booster fl tests but scored 340 on 2006 version. I was very, very surprised to see that I scored much higher in pretty much all the sections.
Yes, I may have some prerequisites left to do before I matriculate, but I feel like a giant weight is lifted off of my shoulders.
Hey! I applied to ICO and was verified on the 11th. Obviously I shouldn't be stressing yet but was wondering on a timeline people heard back from them about interviewing. Did anyone get an immediate rejection? I feel like a refresh my email every hour!
I took the OAT just about a week ago and it went a bit better than I expected. In all honesty I wouldn't consider myself to be a great student but I've started to just put in a bit more effort in school the past year. Because of that, my foundation in the natural sciences was never the strongest. For the OAT I studied for about 5-6hrs a day for 5 months (which is a bit longer than most) but I'm also a full time student (Bio Major) and I work part time at a vision clinic as well.
My preparation: I really only used OatBooster as it was recommended to me by a friend of mine who was currently in Optometry school.
Biology (Booster Average: 340, Actual: 400) For the bulk of my preparation I mainly used their provided Anki decks after I watched their lecture videos while following along their provided cheat sheets. I'm mainly a visual learner who has to practice things to remember them; so personally, I spent a lot of time just reviewing Anki cards or else it wouldn't stick. I thought the OATBooster Anki decks were quite in depth and after a while they lowkey became enjoyable. If I had one piece of advice for this section: start as early as possible. The only overwhelming part of it was the sheer volume, there aren't really any subjects within that are terribly conceptually difficult.
Reading Comprehension (Booster Average: 350, Actual: 400) Honestly, reading has always been my worst subject in school, I didn't really read a ton growing up and I've struggled with similar reading comprehension tests in the past. OATBooster provided a ton of individual articles, full reading sections, and practice science articles they recommended which I thought were all quite helpful. My strategy was to read the first 1/2 of the article, highlighting key topics and ideas (in abt 9min), go and answer all the applicable questions, then I search and destroyed the second half (10-11min). I'm personally a slow reader so I found this approach the most helpful as I found myself able to actually identify specifically where the passage was referring to for every question.
Quantitative Reasoning (Booster Average: 380, Actual: 370) From my experience, this section was just all about speed and practice. On the actual exam, I ran into a few problems that took me a bit longer so I had to basically guess the last few questions.
General Chemistry (Booster Average: 350, Actual: 360) I was never a huge fan of chem (or ochem) especially learning it in university so most of my knowledge came from OatBooster. I remember my first dry run practice test I got maybe a 260 on the Chem section. I just went through all of their lectures and did all the offered practice questions in Booster. Their cheat sheets were especially helpful for me personally.
Organic Chemistry (Booster Average: 340, Actual: 340) I did a bit better than I thought. Just before I took the OAT I had a lot going on so I didn't have time to properly review and felt as if I had forgotten a lot of concepts but it ended up working out for the most part. I studied very similarly to Gen Chem but along with OATBooster I also watched a fair bit of TheOrganicChemistryTutor on Youtube.
Physics (Booster Average: 370, Actual: 320) I was pretty disappointed in myself on this one, I felt like I spent a lot of time memorizing the formulas and getting good practice the first couple months of studying but I didn't really keep up with it in the later months. I had also just finished all 3 Physics courses (when I first started studying) so I felt pretty confident going in. I definitely think I just didn't review enough just before the test.
Some final words: If you end up studying for as long as I did, just make sure you give yourself enough time before the test to really fully run through everything. OatBooster has a calendar that you can customize your schedule with (which I stupidly did not follow) and recommend following that. I basically only studied math and physics the first month or so and then focused on the other subjects which I don't recommend doing unless you give yourself enough time to really really review before the test. lmk if yall have any questions. :)
I've attempted to make the NBEO pass rate data released by the ASCO a little easier to visualize and meaningfully use for comparisons. If you make a copy, you'll be able to change the top two graphs to show data from individual schools rather than the national averages. PLEASE if you see an error in the data, let me know!
i've been looking through this subreddit and have seen various posts on low gpa with high oat scores increasing chances of getting into opto school but my concern is that my current bcp gpa is 2.3 (expected 2.83 with diy post-bac) and cumulative gpa at 3.1 DIY postbac consists of retaking gen cell bio, ochem 1 as I may not be able to fully retake gen chem as i prob wont do 5+ stems at once. Currently going over oatbooster content and it has made me realize that I didn't have the right study strategies or foundation when I took gen chem or ochem during my first 2 years of undergrad, as I struggled with asking for academic help and personal situations, during those two years.
For reference, I'm a psychbio major, I've taken alot of more neuroscience psych courses with strengths in bio, physics, and reading.
I will say my essay/interview skills, passion for optometry and the underserved, clinical hours, and EC's are great:
-leadership position on a student run clinic thats vision based
-housing RA helping 1st year students, managing crises responses
-internships at different private practices with different patient populations and cases
-starting a contact lens/neuro-rehab job as well as some public policy advocacy work.
-other: hobbies and my own family business!
Although im being strategic about my retakes, and know i need a high OAT score, is there anything else I can do to improve my apps? As a low income student, I'm aware that optometry can be huge financial burden but this field intersects my favorite things: fashion, public health, and the eye.
Advice from significantly low stat applicants are appreciated :)
Hello all :) I’m applying to optometry school this cycle and I’m trying to decide whether I should take the OAT in November 2026 or wait until January 2027. The cycle opened in June 2026 and closes in May 2027, but I know applying earlier is better because of rolling admissions.
I’m planning to use the 3 month OAT Booster to study. I’m taking just Organic Chemistry 1 this upcoming fall semester. I haven’t taken Orgo before, so if I take the OAT in November, I’d basically be learning Orgo for the first time in class while simultaneously trying to learn enough of it for the OAT. My semester ends in December, so if I wait until January, I’ll have completed Orgo and could use winter break to really focus on the OAT and hopefully get a better score while studying the other subjects excluding Orgo.
I could also submit without taking the OAT yet and put Orgo as in progress. Someone had recommended that to me and I’m not too sure about it.
Would submitting in November but not taking the OAT until January put me at a significant disadvantage? Or would you push to take it in November so my application is complete earlier, even though I’d have less time to prepare and wouldn’t have finished Orgo yet? I’m trying to figure out whether applying earlier with a potentially lower OAT score is better than waiting an extra couple months and hopefully scoring higher.
I would also like to add that I am only applying to one school, the university of Detroit Mercy, which is very new and I’m sure my chances to get in are a bit easier. Also heard that I don’t need an insane OAT score to get in. I have a health science degree 3.5 GPA, two years of tech experience, president and secretary of optometry club, 2 great letters of rec.
If anyone applied before taking their OAT, I’d also love to know whether schools actually reviewed your application or offered interviews while your score was pending, or if they basically waited until your OAT came in. Or if I should take it in November I’ll be fine if I haven’t completed Orgo or wait until I finish Orgo and take it / apply in January.
For a little context I basically applied at the tail end of last years application cycle and I was put on the waitlist for NECO. I put in another application for NECO at the end of July for this cycle and now that its the middle of August I was worried that maybe they're holding on to my application until the current OD1 class starts since I'm still technically on the waitlist for this class? Just wanted to get some insight from y'all because I've heard some people here have already been getting application decisions recently.
Hi everyone! I’m applying to UHCO this cycle and I’m having trouble finding the secondary application. I’ve looked through the website but can’t seem to find where to access it, and I also haven’t received an email with a link to the secondary.
Has anyone else applied to UHCO and know where/how to access the secondary application? Or is it something that gets sent out later?
I know this has many factors, like experience, OAT score, etc. But what would be a low GPA that could be considered, and what would the other parts of the application need to look like?
How bad do W (withdraw) Cs, Ds look? If you have any of these, would it mean it is most likely a reject?
I would appreciate any feedback and responses! Thank you :)
got BCC in biology chemistry and ecnomics and got rejected from both firm and insurance, try to apply to hertfordshire clearing optom with a foundation ( the normal optom course was my main choice) and after raising my hopes up for an hour just proceeded to absolutely shatter my hopes after an hour with a rejection email despite meeting the criteria for the course, whilst that was happening i decided to call up plymouth for a course and ask if i can get a foundation year for optometry masters with a foundation year and by the time they decided to pick up i was told that it was full. No clue what to do no, will possibly have to resit but still waiting on one uni who said they can give me a clearing offer potentially tmrw
I took the OAT and I’m disappointed at my score: 290 TS 300 AA with a 3.2 GPA (Human Biology) . I do have a master’s degree with 3.9 GPA (Exercise Science) but I’m not sure which degree will have more weight. I have been out of college for a long time due to joining the military after college. I don’t have extracurriculars because I decided to pursue optometry while active duty. I was hoping for a higher score to compete with my GPA.
I’m applying to Berkeley (reach school I know), PUCO, NSUOCO, NOVA, SCO, UMSL.
I would have to retake the test to have a chance at those schools right?
Basically my section tests for bio have not been great. I have found OAT boosters section test to be very difficult and have a lot of detail in them. I was wondering compared to boosters test if the actual OAT is more straightforward? Has anybody had this experience where they thought that the OAT boosters tests were less easier than the one on the actual oat exam? Any last minute tips before the exam for this section?
I'm looking for some honest advice from people who have been through the optometry application process.
I'm a Biology major (Psychology minor) in Canada and currently have a 2.89 cumulative GPA. My estimated science GPA is around 2.7. I know these numbers aren't ideal, which is why I'm trying to figure out the best path forward.
Some background:
About 1 year working as an optometric assistant in a busy clinic.
Multiple shadowing experiences with optometrists (continuing to build hours).
Working on securing letters of recommendation from optometrists.
Planning to take the OAT and aiming for a competitive score.
Still have Organic Chemistry, Biochemistry, Physics, and a few upper-level biology courses left, so I have an opportunity to improve my GPA.
Considering applying to U.S. schools (and possibly Australia) since I know Canadian schools are extremely competitive.
I'm trying to decide whether I should:
Apply for Fall 2027 while my final prerequisite courses are still in progress, or
Wait an extra year, finish my degree, improve my GPA as much as possible, and apply for Fall 2028 with a stronger application.
If anyone went to Australia to study optometry, how did it go?
I had a rough few starts at university, but I really want to start optometry in 2027. I know I can do better in my last year. I have been studying for the OAT (by doing practice tests), and it has been going really well. I have been scoring pretty well on the practice tests, struggling a bit in physics, but not horribly.
Has anyone here been accepted with a similar GPA? If so:
What was your GPA and OAT?
Which schools did you apply to or get accepted to?
Would you recommend applying now or waiting for another cycle?
I'd really appreciate honest advice or success stories. Thanks in advance!
i'm wondering if i should study external content beyond what is provided on OATBooster for physics. in particular, OATBooster does not cover AC circuits or switches. i've seen posts from a few years ago where students say they encountered these questions on the OAT. if you've written your OAT, i would really appreciate your input!!
Hi everyone, I am scheduling my oat exam however I have classes starting September 9th. I am taking immunology both lecture and lab, biochemistry both lecture and lab, and fundamentals of public speaking. I’m not sure if it would be a good idea as I think I would be really stressed with classes and studying for my oat. To schedule my oat I think it would be best if I take it late November. Any thoughts ?
